It was an uncharacteristically boisterous and loud night at the Tarquinian Palace, especially since the days that the Autarch’s Austerity had descended upon the Holy City of Donom Dei. Paid for by the guests who attended the feast, the party, none could say that the Autarch was engaging in the frivolity of nobility. Especially since they had demanded it, and required an event suitable for what they thought a man of such power should have. New fresh silk for the walls, carpets never trodden upon, musicians and beautiful performers from as far as Caelus and an eight course dinner menu to rival a king of old times, as well as demonstrations of new technology and weaponry, even surreptitious stashes of opium and other pleasure drugs to be stealthily given over to those who could not celebrate without it. There was nothing that couldn’t be asked for, and the generosity of the collective pockets spilled into the streets, though the Capital Police ensured that everything was in respectful order, and there was not a hint of debauchery to be found anywhere but within the walls of the Tarquinian.

Di Avolo knew well of what had brought this party into being, as he had helped plan it down to the bright golden lights that newly shone like the sun in the vaulting above. Sank quite a bit of money and favors into it, though nothing he could not gain again. It was not for his sake, and none here would know of his significance in it, even if they read the list of donors and took the meager official sum of his tribute as humble fibbing.

He was at this party here, looking unassuming as ever. An important person to know for societal connections, yes, but none assumed he had any actual power or authority, except those in the know. The austere Gilician temple knight grandmasters, sneering at the excess, thought a man without a blade at his side to be feeble. The blue headed Paellan bachelors and princesses, sent as envoys but acting more like unhinged delinquents slipping away with whomever they fancied at the first opportunity, saw no might in Di Avolo’s seemingly middling coffers of coin and plain dress. Moss-headed Trelani and their duskier and wilder Kallean cousins were as ever in their own picture of the world, that they had painted as looking down upon the others. They’d have preferred the other Azure Halls champion for his wife, but he had fallen out of his place of influence, so dealings had to be made with the Autarch. Any Halmeggian envoys were absent or hidden, so it was only the lone diplomat from the Grossreich who seemed to take any pause when he regarded Di Avolo, seeing something beneath what all other eyes slipped off of.

Especially when eyes slipped off of Di Avolo and onto his accompaniment, though she was ironically seeking that unseen truth. As his escort, Di Avolo had taken along a young thing half his age, the socialite Alessandra Ferrara.

She was dark and sensual, tall and slim, hypnotizingly elegant in her beauty, her onyx hair descending like a waterfall of ink over bronze shoulders, blending with the black dress that clung to her body like a river running off of her from the breast to the thigh. Yet Di Avolo would not dream of plucking this young sweet fruit, for perhaps the famously ogrish Julio Di Alba would pluck his own daughter, as Di Avolo had no doubts he already had, but Di Avolo followed actual principles. Alessandra was the first of two illegitimate and only children, her Sea-Vitelian mother the only woman so enchanting that he was bewitched into taking her without heed for the future.

If Di Avolo had recognized her, she would be a Di Nera like the half-brother she did not know, but he had not wished that. He loved her as a father should, but if she was to inherit nobility, she would earn such a place as he had to. As he intended her to. With her reputation and her own network of strings to pull on, she was well on her way to worthiness. Her sharp and cunning eyes, like a fox on the hunt, instinctively sought prey as she prodded her father with questions. She assumed his openness was because he had lust for her. No such thing, he only felt pride in his brood, who had clawed her way from common birth to here with only the advantages of her father’s mind and her mother’s body.

“I can’t help but notice,” Alessandra trilled, “That the Autarch is missing from his own festivities. Does he not want to show his Halmeggian milk-cow to the lords of the realm? Does he have more important things to do, with so many who have traveled so far to see him here? Or has he taken much in monetary donation and arrangements to craft an insult?”

Di Avolo glanced over with a smile, “Are you asking for my opinion?”

“I am asking if you know the truth.” Alessandra said, fluttering her eyelashes and sipping from a tall flute of freshly poured sparkling red wine.

“I know well of the Autarch’s past, and his present character. He has changed remarkably little. Not a family man, not a lush, he is as ever a simple soldier.”

“The soldier is not here with the generals and their appointments, though,” Alessandra gestured to a gaggle of young officers who were drooling over her, “So you imply...?”

Di Avolo felt no need to be forthcoming in spoken word, but yes. As the Augustans reveled here, the Autarch inspected his armies, to see if the picture the martial factions of influence sold him was the truth. As per Di Avolo’s indirect suggestion, of course, smart advice distributed through an appropriate marionette. Strings for strings.

Alessandra’s eyes narrowed. “I should hope for him that they do not overthink his absence, then.”

“They think themselves superior because of the Autarch’s common birth,” Di Avolo said, “An ally of convenience. He is no general, no noble, nothing they are accustomed to seeing as more than a tool.”

“Then they will regret underestimating him.” Alessandra said coolly, a hint of spite in her expression and the curl of lip.

Di Avolo stroked her cheek, letting a bit of truth go to her. “You know that sentiment well, don’t you? Yet you know the opportunities well enough too.”

Quick as his daughter was, he saw the doubt in her eyes right away. The question of why a man would caress her cheek in comfort rather than groping at her flesh, pawing at her in desire, even if it was of the restrained touches and pokes acceptable in public. It would be all the hint she’d have for now. She’d figure out soon enough.

“Come, though,” Di Avolo led Alessandra along, “If you wish to know how the generals care for the party of the moment in spite of the absence of the host, let me introduce you to the men most worth speaking to. Though you’d best not think of leaving my side, hm?”

-----

September 9, 1928 – Deep Beneath the Vitelian Sea

Marz Von Trocken of the Aurora Legion received updates from the front above every few days, though he’d preferred to have had them every night. It hardly mattered that little of consequence was happening yet, it was a window somewhere besides this test facility, where he felt he and his volunteer unit were the only ones sitting around with no opportunities to win glory and renown. Yes, he held a privileged position here, as commander of an experimental armor unit like none would ever see, but he was a young man and twice as impatient as any his age. The Stijder might be the future of warfare, but it felt as though progress was so slow that the future might also pass by before he led this new tank company into the future it was being made to fight for.

Each day was busywork, constant tests with equipment that was exhausting to operate, the tests themselves made to be as fatiguing as possible, with solutions for reported problems often being just as troublesome. It was common for Von Trocken to start screaming at the hapless mole-rat engineers and scientists out of indignant frustration, especially when common breakdowns with the furthest developed panzers, left he or his unit doing nothing but sitting on their hands. Required to be at constant readiness in case repairs were completed faster than usual or new tools were made on the spot to be trained on, it wasn’t even possible to make his own pastime. The snapping back and forth between grueling work and boredom was driving him mad, and he was certain, plenty of his comrades here.

If they were allowed to go into a city to see dancing girls clad in naught but a thin second skin through which light passed through at very brief angles, tantalizingly flashed through in pose and movement, that would be enough. Even to get to eat good food and drink liquor, it might have been a tolerating grind, but instead the testing facility had become their prison. The only hope was that at the end of this, it would all prove to be so terribly worth it that not only would the Aurora Legion have a panzer unit that stood head and shoulders above any other, but also that such would be recognized by the Legion’s leadership. A captaincy at the age of 20 if Von Trocken was lucky, 21 assuredly…perhaps he could convince the leader, Bonaventura, to even advance him a rank above that, in recognition of the special capability? Such a young man of high rank was unprecedented save in times where history was made…

Not everybody agreed, though, such as Von Trocken’s own scholarly gunner.

“Perhaps this is a good excuse to brush up on your Utopian theory, hm?” The bespectacled Imperial asked as he paged through a new treatise that had arrived by mail, “You aren’t thinking of fighting for Socialism and such without understanding what you’re bringing about, are you?”

“Bah,” Von Trocken scraped his foot along the ground with contempt, like a fenced bull, “I know well enough of that, and what we’re going to bring about. What use is knowing every miniscule detail of every tract by heart if you win no battles? You train so seldomly, I wonder if you should be in accounting if you weren’t such a good shot. I don’t wonder how you’re a virgin, with how you dote on paper instead of girls.”
His gunner raised an eyebrow and flashed a smile of crooked white teeth. “I also don’t wonder that with you. I think you’re in no place to give advice, my lord. Even I could tell you better what to do if you’re so intent on finding your way between any legs but Katze’s.”

“I could do better than that.”

“Why so sore? Is it because she offered, or because she said it was out of pity?”

“I’m not in any mood to be mocked right now. I’ve got nobody to take myself out on.”

“That may not be the case for long,” the gunner mused coyly, “I’ve heard tell of a coming field test opportunity. There’s been a setback near here where the local militias have been outmatched by ferocious beasts. Ones that need our cannon and mobility perhaps.”

Von Trocken seized up with anticipation and wild imagining. A glimmer dancer had just bent in a way that he could see the pink edges of something. “Ferocious beasts? Are they nature or a machination of the Sovereignty? They’d have little choice but to send out whatever was available if it was the latter, what else would be a target but these lands?”

“It’s only a rumor,” the gunner teased, “You know how the mole rats are. But it’ll be enough for them to have to spill out how to properly maintain and repair these things. I doubt these eggheads have the stomachs to risk being eaten by Living Stones.”

“Even if they don’t risk these machines,” Von Trocken said hopefully, “We have other prior models here. Left unguarded. Functional.”

“How naughty of you to know that.”

Von Trocken flashed an intense look towards the outside, through the wall of the dome. “Whether they want to or not, they’ll be grateful to us soon enough. And even a single Legionnaire shan’t ever be underestimated by these pale faces again.”

-----

September 10, 1928 – Nuvole Blu Isles, The Vitelian Sea

You are Palmiro Bonaventura. Once upon a time, your close friends called you Bonetto, preferring the shortened version of your surname to your true one. Palmetto lacked the proper masculinity for a man like you, Leo had argued successfully. Now, you might not have had anybody near who would use that name for you. Palmiro, Papa, or amongst the Legion, Legato di Legione. That was a new one, from those who thought it strange to call you Capo or Boss or Fuhrer (a lot of the Legion’s newer blood came from New Nauk speaking places), but the lofty title had been selected without your input by the top command staff and the administration, and so it would stick. So Legato it was, strange as it was to use such a title for the lead of a mercenary troop rather than, say, the Old Nauk term for one of the generals of the empire, translated twice over.

Your recent concerns hadn’t been entirely with the Legion, though, nor the Harzwohlkan War it had been fighting. Your mind had been on your ominous final meeting with Leo, the last that you were like to have for a while. Besides that, other close to home matters had made themselves a problem over the past couple of weeks.

When you and Yena were in bed lately, stoking the fires of her needy libido again, you had been having…trouble. Not the sort expected of age, thank goodness, but that would have also been easy to solve. No, you had been having trouble with the part Yena enjoyed most. Actually concluding. The stamina was the sort many men would probably be jealous of, but it wasn’t a willing sort, nor was it desired. It actually seemed to severely wound your wife’s pride, that she couldn’t bring you over the edge. You’d have thought that bringing her to her climax would be enough, but she would sulk in bitter silence over it, like she felt bad about enjoying herself, that she became too exhausted to continue even after unreasonable time spent. To be true, she’d never made a secret that she didn’t consider any sort of sexual activity proper if you didn’t give over your seed inside at the end. With all the children she’d given you and the responsibility in family rearing she had, it seemed that sex was a vital part of Yena’s end-of-day decompression and emotional release- especially with the havoc that pregnancy played upon her body and mind, despite having been so regularly with child that she was well accustomed to its effects.

There was no logical reason why sleeping with her wasn’t giving you climax. It wasn’t that she lacked for beauty, as even at forty years of age, she had lost little, and by virtue of being by your side so long, gained much. It wasn’t that she lacked appreciated skill in intimacy either, as you knew each other’s bodies very well, to the point that you knew Yena kept count, and the numbers had become comically high enough to sound like a cryptic code if it were ever told to anybody out of context. Yet she refused to acknowledge that the problem might be with you rather than her.

“It’s this island,” you theorized one evening as you walked with her along the beach, children left in the care of others or to their own devices so that your wife could breathe. “This feeling of exile. To be here is to have the reality of what has happened constantly in my face. We are not in a place I could call home nor holiday. The Legion is around us, and they are in a war. It disturbs my focus.” Yena was quiet, letting your words slip around her. So you grasped her waist and held her close. “You’re already pregnant anyways, dearest. What does it matter?”

Yena grumbled at you in a half-mumbled complaint. “That does not mean I do not like the feeling. Love it in every way. Besides that, I cannot help your command, fight in your army, but you have many who can do that. Only I can relieve your tension…and you have been so full of it lately, yet I can do nothing. It should make a woman ashamed, should it not? To ever have a time when she cannot give her husband pleasure and release?”

“Ashamed? Never.” You sighed, “It’s like an…illness, Yena. I will get over it.” Though it was another problem on the pile of a sort you didn’t know how to address.

“I suppose,” Yena allowed, “There are many eyes upon you here…”

>It’s a symptom of a greater overshadowing thing. You do need to leave this place for elsewhere, with Yena, and perhaps with nobody else, for a time… (Where to?)
>The Legion might have been able to take care of itself, but as its leader, you couldn’t leave it during times like this. You would simply have to endure.
>Other?

When you returned from your walk, it wasn’t time to satisfy your wife or yourself, though, as an adjutant staff was waiting for you to come back with a missive from the front…

-----

An unexpected event had occurred in the war beneath the sea, where the Harzwohlkan battled over their future- and the Aurora Legion fought for but one front, but their presence had already been well felt.

What had been envisioned as a relatively small-scale raid to destroy the rail complex called the Staalstazzon, the Steel Station, had ballooned quickly into a grand assault by around half of the Aurora Legion along with its supporting assets. An attack of a scale impossible for the Union Army’s managerial pace to have planned so quickly, the sudden assembly and seemingly arbitrary attack had also caught the Sovereignty off guard: the battle was another easy one as the subterranean reactionaries were outnumbered and outflanked from every angle, and completely overwhelmed by superior firepower.

More than the station being captured along with the trains and equipment in it, there was a vast, vulnerable crack in the Sovereignty’s battle lines, a hole that other units from both sides were flowing into like water, pulling the rest of the frontline towards it like a whirlpool. That had become apparent to Commander Alga mere hours after accomplishing the operational objective. In the original plan, the station was to be sabotaged, abandoned, and destroyed. He was still considering it in spite of communiques now urging the contrary. He might claim it as communications failing to reach him in time and thus simply following through with the original orders. Now though, it felt like the eye of a storm that hadn’t quite come together yet. Reinforcements called reinforcements, not even necessarily because of the station or any exploitation or recapture of it, but merely because there was a void that needed to be addressed as soon as possible. Like a bridge under stress, groaning from the strain of its own weight after but a single support fell. Continuous probing had found little resistance over the past week, a state of affairs that seemed to demand action.

For the Sovereignty, the objective was seemingly to maintain the line. That was what Donomo Alga would assume they would have wanted, considering their defensive posture and lesser resources. The Legion wasn’t preparing to exploit this dangerous gap, however, as the Union tripped over their own forces trying to rush for what their objective was- which was now within reach of the Legion and their allies in this operation. A large settlement called Rookpoel, a large sprawling town by an underground lake. It was also, from the white columns that stretched to the ceiling, tributed to by a series of steam vents and springs. The steam contributed to coating both the settlement and the surrounding valleys in a dense white fog, the other element making the place practically wreathed in cotton from the outside being the mass bonfires of incense vapors.

Aside from being one of the many sources of the constant damp that formed the Gallery’s climate, the lake was the source of canals that not only distributed water around the region, but also formed a maritime logistical network that went all the way back to the Sovereignty’s capital, the heart of whatever war industry remained.

The reason for wanting to take the place was obvious, but Alga could already smell poor fortunes. Being the first ones into what would likely be a meat grinder was rarely wise, and moreover, the place was so desirable that he couldn’t help but suspect a trap for it being so ill defended. The Wolkmihnar companies that had accompanied the Legion on this operation certainly thirsted for further glory. The assault on the station had been planned with them alongside, but the numbers were such that the Legion’s men exceeded their Harzwohlkan allies, and an easy success was clearly not enough to sing about in the days they anticipated coming.

It wasn’t Alga’s decision to make, though, nor was it the Wolkmihnar’s. The Boss would be saying whether to press on or not- even as the opportunity seemed to be a matter of initiative and haste…

Fourth Company remained on reconnoitering duties, especially with the chaos of the recent, but they hadn’t reported back in a couple days. A matter of concern, though Alga trusted Captain Schoenbijter to not have messed up. Third Company was in Sosaldt and the newly formed Sixth Company maintained their garrison in the tunnels, but the remainder of the Legion was at the ready. First, Second, and Fifth Companies, as well as the Heavy Mortar Company, were fully replete with soldiers and supplies, while two companies of allied Harzwohlkan infantry were also well prepared for battle. The Wolkmihnar companies had been affectionately dubbed Third and Fourth Company, as the actual Third and Fourth of the Legion were not present.
The information had been prepared, enciphered, and sent upwards some hours ago. Only now did the orders return:

>Make the attack at once: Even if the enemy was not so vulnerable they seemed, the Legion could take on the Sovereignty even at their fiercest, surely.
>If there was the smell of a trap there was no need to get close enough to know the taste of one. Have the Legion dig in at the Steel Station and maintain a defensive posture.
>There was no need to overcommit, nor to be overly cautious, merely a need to be ready. Have the Legion remain near and ready to react to whatever might be demanded by their allies or the situation.
>Other?

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3.89 MB GIF

I set up a Rentry for the thread lists and archives for this and the rest of the setting stories. Pastebin was getting long in the tooth for a while, though I still have stuff to add to it.
https://rentry.co/PanzerCommanderQuest
Twitter is @scheissfunker for various art and updates and stuff.
Don't hesitate to ask questions about anything, of course, regarding in-character or in-setting knowledge.

>>6329949
>It’s a symptom of a greater overshadowing thing. You do need to leave this place for elsewhere, with Yena, and perhaps with nobody else, for a time… (Go to Naukland to visit your first son.)

>>6329951
>There was no need to overcommit, nor to be overly cautious, merely a need to be ready. Have the Legion remain near and ready to react to whatever might be demanded by their allies or the situation.

>>6329951
>It’s a symptom of a greater overshadowing thing. You do need to leave this place for elsewhere, with Yena, and perhaps with nobody else, for a time… (Go back to Lapizlazulli for a few days)

I'd like to go to Naukland to visit Lorenzo at some point but it's likely too much of a time commitment right now.

>There was no need to overcommit, nor to be overly cautious, merely a need to be ready. Have the Legion remain near and ready to react to whatever might be demanded by their allies or the situation.

>>6329949
>>6329951
Supporting >>6329963

>>6329949
>The Legion might have been able to take care of itself, but as its leader, you couldn’t leave it during times like this. You would simply have to endure.
>>6329951
>If there was the smell of a trap there was no need to get close enough to know the taste of one. Have the Legion dig in at the Steel Station and maintain a defensive posture.

>>6329951
>It’s a symptom of a greater overshadowing thing. You do need to leave this place for elsewhere, with Yena, and perhaps with nobody else, for a time… (Where to?)
Emre is nice this time of year I hear, as long as there is something else to do than sip wine for Yena.

>There was no need to overcommit, nor to be overly cautious, merely a need to be ready. Have the Legion remain near and ready to react to whatever might be demanded by their allies or the situation.

>>6329953
Your willingness to throw Anya straight into the teeth of internet trends is one of your most entertaining habits

>>6329949
>It’s a symptom of a greater overshadowing thing. You do need to leave this place for elsewhere, with Yena, and perhaps with nobody else, for a time… (Naukland)

>>6329951
>There was no need to overcommit, nor to be overly cautious, merely a need to be ready. Have the Legion remain near and ready to react to whatever might be demanded by their allies or the situation.

>>6329951
Supporting >>6329963

>>6329951
>The Legion might have been able to take care of itself, but as its leader, you couldn’t leave it during times like this. You would simply have to endure.
>There was no need to overcommit, nor to be overly cautious, merely a need to be ready. Have the Legion remain near and ready to react to whatever might be demanded by their allies or the situation.

File: pantsu_halloween_special copy.png (5.87 MB, 2000x1790)

5.87 MB PNG

>>6329963
>>6330056
>>6330347
>>6330409
You haven't seen Lorenzo in some time- and seen the northern source of Imperium never...

>>6329992
Where better than back home?

>>6330083
>>6330437
It's the season to not nut anyways.

>>6330108
It's time to get your wife a new atom suit from the source.

>6329963
>6329992
>6330056
>6330108
>6330347
>6330409
>6330437
Keep an eye on it- and a hand out.

>6330083
Pull back, something's smelly underground.

I'll get to writing the update when I wake up.

>>6330108
>Your willingness to throw Anya straight into the teeth of internet trends is one of your most entertaining habits
She's tough enough to handle it. Though sometimes I'm tricked into it.

>>6329949
>The Legion might have been able to take care of itself, but as its leader, you couldn’t leave it during times like this. You would simply have to endure.

>>6329951
>>If there was the smell of a trap there was no need to get close enough to know the taste of one. Have the Legion dig in at the Steel Station and maintain a defensive posture.

Sorry for the late response feel free to ignore my vote if its too late.

Good to see you back tanq, i am in love with the OP drawings for this series, cool as fuck yet ominous.

I ended up making up a prior sleep cycle and woke up very late today, so I have to abbreviate this update.

>>6330556
>I am in love with the OP drawings for this series,
I appreciate it, it's also an opportunity to be pretty blatant as far as symbolism goes. Though I've tried to tie in a little with each iteration since a while back, it's never been this fantastical.

Orders from Legato: Maintain readiness posture, do not advance. Be ready for any change in situation. Combat readiness is prioritized over action at this moment. Keep an eye out for a trap or reversal in fortunes.

So, Alga’s decision was thus made. The ambitious and impetuous Wolkmihnar were made restless by not getting to attack this seeming vulnerability, but satisfied by the possibility itself not being denied. It did mean that any defensive measures would be half-ready by nature, so Alga certainly hoped it wasn’t a trap.

Perhaps it would give time for Fourth Company to make themselves known again, along with whatever information they had found in ranging so far…

-----

The news from underground turned out to not be too dangerous- but it could have been, if you had made a hotheaded decision. However, you were far from the front, and you would not be a copy of one of the leaders who had been in command of you when you had been part of the frontlines. Already you had done more than the Union of Harzwohlkan had demanded, and if they had not asked for further action from you, there was no reason to do anything risky. Especially when you intended to address personal affairs rather than looking for a reason to get more deeply involved with affairs below.

It was true enough that you shouldn’t be away from the Legion these days for long, even for just a short holiday, even if none of the men would question it, but the alternative seemed to be letting your closest relations fray away ever so gradually. So, you’d quit of these shores, just for a time, to go somewhere else. Perhaps you’d see something important that you hadn’t before.

Combining motivations, you arranged to go and see Lorenzo, your oldest son, who was in higher education in Naukland’s capital of Stor Ankomst. It had been more than a year since you or your wife last saw your eldest son, and your firstborn Vittoria had gotten her time. Your babies would come along, both because Lorenzo had a new brother he’d never met, and because while there were those of the Legion trustworthy enough to mind after the needs of children, none would provide what an infant needed of their parents.

As for your other children, besides Vittoria, who was attending university…

>Bring them along. It might be for your nerves, but it was also to see Lorenzo, who had been away from the others just as much as you.
>Leave them with the Legion on Nuvole Blu. They were safest surrounded by the men.
>Send them home for a time to Lapizlazulli. They might not be surrounded by soldiers there, but it was their house, and Elena would take good care of them.
>Other?

Planning a series of flights to Naukland was not simple nor cheap, since most of those who bothered to make direct trips were often business representatives or similarly privately funded individuals, but it was far from impossible. All it necessitated was flying over the Reich, which was easier now than it had ever been, to Delsau.

Which was the only place along any practical path you in particular seemed to be readily permitted besides Sosaldt. Apparently your fame had gotten the better of you in the societally stagnated cental and southern west of Vinstraga, in Sosalia, where your name was known as that of a dangerous anarchist agitator. Not how you would describe yourself, but they could have their labels. You weren’t interested in visiting those places anyways. The whole thing would take a week to prepare, during which time you kept an ear to the ground for what occurred below, just in case. You’d only be away for a few days at most, since Naukland was one of the few places you didn’t know the tongue to speak in (though you might have, if you were of the mind to read Cathedra text in its original format), but that was always enough time for unexpected and unpleasant developments to happen in a war, even an unseen and unheard one.

As interested as you’d be in hearing what your son had learned in one of the foremost engineering schools in the world, you couldn’t help but be more interested in another object of more recent news: he had met a lady friend that he had gotten bold enough to tell you about in his letters. One appropriate to his age. The boy had spent too long being meek around the fairer sex, and with Vittoria remaining distressingly single, you were eager to measure the quality of your son’s speculation. Since he seemed suspect of this girl, who he admitted seemed to not be particularly well suited to the engineering school, who needed his help a lot of the time. Who seemed to be evading the particular notice of Vang who might have otherwise commented if it seemed to be a threat.

“Naukland’s peaks are thin of the folk,” Yena said skeptically of that. “I would rather he be less hasty, if possible.”

Yes, Yena wanted at least one line of her children to be “pure-blooded,” at least by Nief’yem blood law standards. Which worked in ways that were contrary to the eye, as Lorenzo was Half Nief’yem while his elder sister, who had not a single strand of green upon her scalp, was considered Full-Blooded, as were her younger sisters. However, the child of a Half and a Full was considered whole no matter if they were girl or boy, so Yena was naturally in support of him choosing a mountain-blooded girl as his father had.

You were not so traditionally minded. “He hardly has to tie himself to the first girl he likes. Vittoria didn’t stick with hers. I didn’t stick around with mine.”

“Elena was from another time, no?”

“Oh, they…” You hadn’t discussed this often with Yena. “They were from the days of the Azure Halls. After Elena had been betrothed to another. At the time, I had to cope with that.” Suffice it to say, Yena was the primary benefactor of you not being unfamiliar with the female body when it came time to put Vittoria inside of her so many years ago. The church may have frowned upon that, but Vitelian society was not of the same mind.

You cut it off there, though. You didn’t want to talk to your wife about how you’d slept with other women, even if it was before meeting her, even if you doubted, she minded at all considering that she had facilitated Benito’s existence. She proved your expectations correct immediately.

“Well,” Yena was more interested than discomforted, “What were they like? I recall that you were very single by the time you wore a uniform…”

>You’d not gotten to know them. Prostitutes were a purpose driven sort, after all, and you likely stopped thinking about each other after a few days.
>A pair of other students, likeminded girls. Adventurous and experimental, even though the relations only lasted for a few months each.
>You had been close to a sea woman, though it had only been for a year. You’d honestly driven her from your mind…though perhaps it wouldn’t have worked out anyways, driven as you were, and that had been the reason to break it off.
>Other?

>>6330814
>Send them home for a time to Lapizlazulli. They might not be surrounded by soldiers there, but it was their house, and Elena would take good care of them.

>A pair of other students, likeminded girls. Adventurous and experimental, even though the relations only lasted for a few months each.

>>6330812
>Leave them with the Legion on Nuvole Blu. They were safest surrounded by the men.

>>6330814
>You had been close to a sea woman, though it had only been for a year. You’d honestly driven her from your mind…though perhaps it wouldn’t have worked out anyways, driven as you were, and that had been the reason to break it off.

>>6330812
>Send them home for a time to Lapizlazulli. They might not be surrounded by soldiers there, but it was their house, and Elena would take good care of them.
>>6330814
>You had been close to a sea woman, though it had only been for a year. You’d honestly driven her from your mind…though perhaps it wouldn’t have worked out anyways, driven as you were, and that had been the reason to break it off.

>>6330814
>Leave them with the Legion on Nuvole Blu. They were safest surrounded by the men.

>A pair of other students, likeminded girls. Adventurous and experimental, even though the relations only lasted for a few months each.

File: mummified.jpg (1.84 MB, 2400x1350)

1.84 MB JPG

>>6330812
>Leave them with the Legion on Nuvole Blu. They were safest surrounded by the men.
>>6330814
>A pair of other students, likeminded girls. Adventurous and experimental, even though the relations only lasted for a few months each.
I don't think I wish to be horny anymore, Yena...

>>6330812
>Bring them along. It might be for your nerves, but it was also to see Lorenzo, who had been away from the others just as much as you.

>>6330814
>You had been close to a sea woman, though it had only been for a year. You’d honestly driven her from your mind…though perhaps it wouldn’t have worked out anyways, driven as you were, and that had been the reason to break it off.

>>6330814
>Leave them with the Legion on Nuvole Blu. They were safest surrounded by the men.

>A pair of other students, likeminded girls. Adventurous and experimental, even though the relations only lasted for a few months each.

>>6330812
>>Leave them with the Legion on Nuvole Blu. They were safest surrounded by the men.

>>6330814
>>You had been close to a sea woman, though it had only been for a year. You’d honestly driven her from your mind…though perhaps it wouldn’t have worked out anyways, driven as you were, and that had been the reason to break it off.

>>6330814
>Bring them along.
>A pair of other students

>>6330817
>>6330860
Back home to the city of the Revolution's birth.

>>6330826
>>6330872
>>6330881
>>6330961
>>6330966
Keep the kids with the Legion.

>>6330904
>>6330988
The whole family is coming to see the eldest son.

Alright, and for the surprisingly divisive one:

>6330817
>6330872
>6330881
>6330961
>6330988
The flitting feelings of couplings of curiosity.

>6330826
>6330860
>6330904
>6330966
The time you were actually bewitched by a siren.

Alright then, updating.

You’d had a couple of short relationships while in the Azure Halls, you told your wife. Brief, but fiery, as passions were in such an environment and age. After Elena had been permanently promised to another, as you’d all but been assured of, you were driven somewhat mad by your mournful desperation, and hooked up with a hill girl in the biology department you’d met and slept with on the same night. She had been fun, you remembered, but exhausting, the sort who took her studies far less seriously than you did while being much more demanding of your time. When one week you realized you’d spent more on condoms than you had on food, you became more wary…and her, eventually, bored. You broke things off, only for her cousin to come your way.

A repeat of the last time, before bouncing back to the other girl, then back again, until the chaos of it rattled your senses enough to stop being dragged about by your member and by grief of love you hadn’t known was lost. Thankfully, you’d not met either of those cousins again, nor knew where they were. Their names even slipped the mind.

“But you proved addicting, did you not, Palmiro?” Yena said affectionately as she wrapped her arms around yours, and reached down to paw at your crotch. “I have always told-”

“I did hear it plenty,” you cut her off, “But you shouldn’t compare yourself. They weren’t good for me. But you couldn’t be better.” Though you’d been well prepared for the demands Yena’s libido had made of you, as it turned out, due to that experience…and you had kept it a secret from the girl-hungry members of the Young Futurists, which had been a great challenge, but Cesare had helped you with that.

…Cesare. How could he…

“Darling?” Yena asked.

“Let us not speak of the past any longer,” you said tautly. “All I want is here with me now.”

Yena was put in the mood, though- even though she was once again disappointed in herself that night. It wouldn’t be long, you assured both her and yourself, when this annoying condition would pass on. When Nuvole Blu wouldn’t be the center of your world for at least a little bit. Even though, in the interests of not uprooting routines, you would be leaving your children besides the babies back here on the island. It was safest for them here, you thought, if it became known to any enemies you were unaware of or underestimated. Even if the entirety of the Legion wasn’t up on the surface guarding them, there were more than enough on rotation, in reserve or replacement training, or simply directly assigned that there should have been nothing to worry about. A good thing, since you expected general stress to be the cause of your present woes.

The eighteenth of September rolled around, by which time you had departed from the island to get a flight from Larrocia to Delsau’s capital of Debut du Leblanc, or as most simply called it, Leblanc. Delsau was a calm and picturesque country, you had heard, but you would not be staying long enough to experience it when Naukland was the destination. Neither were you unhappy to not be able to see much of Larrocia before departing. It had become uncanny and discomforting to see how it had changed from when you had managed the peace of the land. The old duke had been assassinated, and in his place the provincial capital had been completely overtaken by Revolutionary League mobs, the city looking half like it had undergone a sack in places. Details that you’d consider having your cousin look into, to tell you of just what the benefit might have been of all this, to Pescatore…

-----

September 18, 1928, Beneath the Vitelian Sea

“Enough of the small talk, Grandmaster. I can tell that you have something to share with me that is not happy news.”

“Your majesty. The Abyssonomers are concerned. They say that the Usurpers are meddling where they shouldn’t, thinking their pioneer settlements fortified against the consequences. Or maybe they’re just willing to take the risk and suffer the damage if it means swifter triumph. The Verbaner tribesmen have had good luck, but I don’t know if it will be enough. Not when the enemy is advancing upon our gates even as we make gains beneath.”

“You do not have to layer ill tidings in honey, Grandmaster. Be true. Have we a chance of beating the Usurpers back in the Gallery?”

“There have been too many setbacks, my queen. We have taken too many losses, and our best chances to regain the initiative risk what we have maintained as very precious. With the aid of the surfacers, the Usurpers have regained their advantage. Even with the new weapons on the way, victory will be extremely difficult to achieve without some sort of sacrifice, and even then, it will be a victory of survival and seeing the next day, not one of songs and festivals.”

“We are a people well used to sacrifice, Grandmaster.”

“…”

“…Has there been any news in finding other ways upwards? Of seeking out other surfacers? The world is vast. Surely we can find somebody sympathetic to our cause.”

“Nay. It is very difficult to find our ways upwards from the passages that go deep. The directions beneath do not correspond to those above. It is feeling blindly in the dark for friends.”

“Then there is no other option than the plan.”

“I am afraid so, your majesty. Nothing else would be so certain to stop the Usurpers.”

“Nothing else would cause as much suffering either. I am undecided. Tell the Council to do whatever they must. Allow the Guilds to do as they will as long as it is for war. Even if the plan succeeds, the Usurpers will be ever persistent…”

-----

September 19, 1928, Stor Ankomst, Naukland

By the time you’d crossed the continent, it had been late. Instead of bothering your son and his escort to only meet you at the end of the day before retiring to an inn, you’d be coming over to his apartment at brunch time. Yena had to be fended off that night- she was eager to end the dry spell, but at this point she was becoming just as much of a stressor as anything else. The next day, you promised her, after you’d caught up properly with your son again.

At night, even on the relative edge of the ancient city, Stor Ankomst had been bright and bustling, even though the night sky itself was dark and deep as it had been beneath the ground. It was brightly lit and the people were still busily sipping coffee, unconcerned about being stimulated so late. That had the expected result in the morning, when you and Yena woke and decided to briefly walk about the neighborhood, Old Nauk phrasebook in hand. It was quiet, chilly, and foggy from the northern sea, and very few people save for ragpickers and street cleaners were about. It struck you how polite they all were: even if it was obvious that you and your wife were foreigners. The superiority that Nauk were supposed to be incurable of didn’t seem to translate into unpleasantness or rudeness. Perhaps your perspective was merely colored by the kind of place that Vitelia had tragically become…

Where Emre had been a place that defied its northern character and insisted on its own ostentatiousness, Stor Ankomst was a place of black and blue-streaked stone, of pointed spires and steep sloping roofs, and perhaps smartly so, as the cold wind already brought down fine flakes of crystals that melted upon coming near the warm earth. Chimneys poured white smoke into the air that melded with the mist, and the fog itself glowed gold and orange from the street lamps and city lights. Long, droning horn calls of ships arriving and departing echoed through the streets from the harbor, a great bay that the city founded by Sversk the Conqueror upon the Nauk’s arrival to Vinstraga wrapped around at its furthest reaches. Not necessarily a tall city all that way, but certainly a wide and spread out one. Distances that guaranteed that motor vehicles inhabited the streets newer than many of the buildings, either because they were, or there was an insistence on keeping the old in the new. Locomotives lazily chuffed alongside wrought iron fences cordoning them off from the other residents of the city, watched diligently by long-furred alley cats perched wherever they could fit. The archaic architecture aside, the density of machines in this city suited the mental image you had kept of it. A place of high technology, if not necessarily the future you envisioned in the dawn.

A good place for Lorenzo, probably.

The apartment he was staying at was near a trolley stop, a common place for students, Astrida had told you in selecting it, though not property owned by the engineering school. Otherwise it would have been wastefully expensive rather than frugally decent, and since Lorenzo nor her demanded the comforts of great space, it did well, even if it wouldn’t be enough for you and the others to stay over in. Much like its neighbors, the place was wide, dark, and austere, with angular juttings of stone running down the lengths and corners being the preferred element of decoration rather than paint or color, like stone carvers had been the only one allowed to touch it after being laid down.

“We are here,” you declared to Yena, who held Lucia and Giacomo close to her chest and back on multicolored patterned slings. “Apartment 244. I wonder if he’s bothered to cut his hair yet. At this rate his length will match yours before his sisters do.”

“Perhaps,” Yena thought aloud, “The women he’s been near prefer it that way?”

“Maybe.” Your ears pricked to the sound of clacking feet upon stone. The acoustics of Nauk buildings were surprisingly absorbent, so when you turned your head, you and the owner of the steps saw one another quite close.

She was dressed in a way that was clearly determined to draw the eye, though not in an outrageous way: a shiny blue silk and decoratively scaled vest over a clingy dress that faded from blue to white like waves of surf, peeks of the shoulder and the neck from clothes purposefully cut taught to a slender figure. She was also had been looking down at what must have been a telegram. Looking like she was about o go on a date was hardly the thing that gave you pause, though. On the continent of Vinstraga, most people were quite pale, and the Nauk were the progenitors of such a tendency, despite their tendency to heavily freckle not necessarily lasting in the descended other races. Even the native peoples such as Yaegir, Nief’yem, Vyemani and Pohja tended to be similar in hue, and Naukland was demographically overwhelmingly of its namesake, as it would prefer. Which made the presence of the brown of a Sea Vitelian completely unexpected, even if the bleached wavy blonde hair that tumbled to the shoulders might have been more in character. The face told that you knew this girl, though- and the expression on it that she knew you just as well.

A heavy silence as you both stared at one another, until you broke it.

“Good day, Comptessa Di Martellosa.” You required no complex deduction to know why she was here. “I didn’t know you had an interest in engineering. Or could speak Old Nauk. You’re quite a long way from the Vitelian Sea, from your islands.”

“Er.” The Sea Vitelian girl had not even twitched, turned to stone. “You must be mistaken. I do not know anybody of that name.”

“Goodness,” Yena commented next, “A Sea Vitelian here? She looks just like Chiara did, doesn’t she? Not just because she is of her colors…”

“I don’t know anybody with that name either!” But she was unmistakable, and playing ignorant was pointless. Her eyes snapped from you, back to the door of the apartment she had been approaching, then back to you. “I must be going!” She turned and walked quickly back down the hall, might have broken into a run if the dress she wore would have allowed for it.

She wasn’t going to be chased, though. You knocked heavily on Lorenzo’s door, and almost immediately, the speckled face of Astrida appeared- and she was unexpectedly possessed of one more arm than you remembered, which you stared at enough to wonder if she was an identical twin.

“Hello boss!” She said brightly, “Hello, Missus Bonaventura!” She saluted, and you noticed she was in a lower cut shirt than you’d preferred her to wear around your son. “Oh, arm. Is a fake one.” Astrida rolled a sleeve up to show. “Lorenzo made it. He should have a lot to tell you about it!” She turned and called back into the apartment. “Lorenzo! Your father mother are here!” A smile back to you. “He forget how time passes when he work.”

Your son came around- and no, he had not cut his hair, though his face, while still soft, had gotten some much needed mannishness to it. “Father,” he said, as he came forward, and you caught him in embrace, “Mother,” He gave Yena the hug next, though he had to maneuver around two babes. “These are…Lucia and…erm…”

“Giacomo,” you supplied.

“Sorry. I feel like it hasn’t even been a year…” Lorenzo looked down awkwardly. “…I don’t know what to say, father. It was easier to say in letters…”

“I am alive, and you are doing well. That’s all that needs to be said.”

Lorenzo nodded shortly, and addressed his guardian as you and Yena let yourselves in through the door. “Astrida, did you, er, see if Irena came by?”

“She didn’t even use a false name…” You said under your breath in amusement.

“Who, the brown girl?” Astrida asked loudly, “No, nobody come to the door besides Boss.”

Lorenzo frowned in disappointment, sighing. “She’s late a lot of the time, but she’s not usually this late. I wonder if she forgot. I was hoping for her to meet you, since…I mean, she’s Vitelian, and Father’s well regarded, aren’t you?” He must have expected more surprise from revealing her nationality, but it didn't come.

You’d like to say you were so regarded by the general populace of your country, even if the people in power might not admit it. Though Irena here already would have had personal experience to draw on rather than the vague picture of a powerful figure.

>Ask your eldest son about anything in particular?
>Other things to do/see?

>>6331283
>Ask your eldest son about anything in particular?

Did Irena tell you why she came to study in Naukland?

Any interesting engineering projects you've had so far in university?

Other things to do/see?
Tour his campus, do some sightseeing of the local landmarks

>>6331283
>Ask your eldest son about anything in particular?
Ask about the pretty young thing that went scampering off as soon as she saw us. Talk to him about his studies and his research. Ask if he's encountered other Neif'yum around and what they're like. Talk to him about his peers and about the general revolutionary fervor or lack there of among the youth. Tell him how the molemen war is going and the scientific advancements learned from them.

>Other things to do/see?
Ask him about romantic date spots and other places of interest worth seeing. A tour around town.

>>6331283
Clarify if Irena is his new girlfriend.
Give him lots of praise and attention (thats part of why we're here)
Take the wife and kids on a sightseeing tour as suggested by other anons (the main tourist traps and the university, and maybe see some tonks if possible)

Does Miss Vang have any revolutionary contacts? Has she been getting a feel for the public sentiment?

>>6331289
Supporting

>>6331289
+1

I must have been more behind on sleep than I thought.

>>6331288
So what's happening here, with the university and you?

>>6331289
>>6331356
>>6331543
Get a window into Lorenzo's life and times, then make fun of him.

>>6331302
So how friend are we talking here?

Updating.

“We did see a pretty young thing scamper away that could only have come from Vitelia,” you said, “I’m guessing that’s Irena?”

Lorenzo’s eyes widened. “Oh. So she did come…but she didn’t want to see you. That’s…not what I expected.”

“She isn’t your girlfriend, is he?” His mother teased as she sat upon an armchair for two- which itself seemed to be where Vang tended to sleep from the size of the place.

That turned your son’s cheeks pink. “No, No, that’s not it,” he said, “We’ve only known each other a couple of weeks.” It could take far less time to get attached than that, you knew, but let him have his logic. “It’s nice to have somebody who speaks good Vitelian around here. Her Old Nauk is better than mine too.”

“That’s an odd language to know, isn’t it?” Yena asked you.

“Not if you insist on reading Cathedra text in its old language.” You said, “But most inclined to that would prefer theological school. Not Engineering over in Naukland, whose Republicans have kept the Cathedra at arm’s length if still in polite regard outwardly. You must know why she’s chosen this of all places, Lorenzo.”

“…Well…” Lorenzo frowned, “She said that it’s for the same reason I came. It’s the best in the world. She has the money for it. Also, Stor Ankomst is one of the largest shipyards and harbors around. It’s a heavy engineering holy city, in a way. I suppose. She’s not very good with the technical aspect of things, though. She’s needed a lot of tutoring, but…I don’t mind.”

“He like to make the girls happy,” Vang said loudly with a laugh, embarrassing your son more, “Lorenzo, tell the Boss about this arm! Is not just some hook hand, see?” She locked the elbow and shifted her shoulder, and you saw the false hand open and close, something you certainly didn’t see much of for prosthetics which had to replace the arm to the shoulder.

Lorenzo had made something like this while being only sixteen years old. What had you been doing when you were sixteen? Could you help being overwhelmed with pride, in spite of any of your boy’s shortcomings from being meek?

“This is an incredible feat for you,” you told Lorenzo, inspecting the false limb, “There are many people whose lives would be changed by things like this. Is this what you’re studying in the university?”

“No,” Lorenzo said, “That was just something I did for fun.” He seemed to realize how that minimized it, and stammered out, “I mean, it wasn’t easy, it was actually a lot of work, but no, I got the idea for that from Imperial artisan books, not from school. They tend to focus on machines that are much bigger. But small, precision machines have a lot of potential for those big ones too.”

“I am lab rat,” Vang said, patting her shoulder, “I do not get money to pay normal, hah hah.”

Few would. Especially in Vitelia. Even if Lorenzo humbly denied that it was the specialist machining that it was: prosthetics were hardly ever general use. That arm had been measured and fitted to put on his guardian, and if it was actuated by movement, it probably wouldn’t work on anybody else without a good deal of adjustments.

“So,” Yena said, moving back to the other subject, “Tell us about Irena, won’t you? Not many of your classmates would have been invited to brunch, would they?”

“She’s…” Lorenzo thought, and searched, “She’s a bit prickly with people, but I don’t think she means it. Mostly I think she’s lonely. When we’re around each other, she’s a lot more relaxed. I don’t think she’s used to…I mean, having friends. Or being with people her age. That sounds weird, but in lectures, with all the older professors, she acts more normal around them than other students. She’s pretty and exotic to this place, so-”

“Oh? Is she?” Yena butted in, and her son turned scarlet.

“Yes, she is, so what? But, but, the point I mean, some of the other students tried to…put the moves on her, I guess. She didn’t like that at all. I think part of why she likes being around me is that I’m younger than her.” He foresaw the next question. “She’s the same age as big sis. A few months older.” So, eighteen. “Irena has a few people watching over her like Ms. Astrida does for me, but I haven’t met them. I think she likes getting the chance to leave them behind so we can do things. There’s a lot to see around here…and I think she never got to see much from wherever she came from. It’s sort of getting in the way of the studies for us, to be honest…”

This sounded like a familiar story, but whenever a woman was taking up enough time to impact studying, it was never because they were merely acquaintances. Lorenzo was getting uncomfortable with getting probed further about the girl, though, so you switched subjects.

“What kind of studies are you doing?” You asked, “Heavy machining, you said?”

Lorenzo nodded eagerly. “The literature of it, not the mathematics. That’s later. After we’ve, well, learned it all. I’m close to that though.” He’d been enrolled for about a year after all. “We go by Northern Locomotives a lot, and that’s always fun, but I don’t think I could get you and mom in. The industry needed to make the power sources for the big machines is more than I imagined. I want to get into the Armor Bureau sometime again, but that’ll have to be for next year. They came out with a new tank this year, you must have heard. The m/28. It’s an iteration on the old m/22. But I’ve heard that tanks are only getting bigger, since the war the Reich made on Fealinn. That secret project…if I could get my eyes on it, that’d be something else…”

You’d have to find the time and space to tell him about what had been found underground. If he wanted esoteric engineering, then the Harzwohlkan would have inspiration and technology that would fascinate him endlessly. Its limits weren’t even known yet to your own research team- they’d have another report ready when you got back, assuredly, but your son would have to wait. Unless you could find something to send securely to him small enough to be packaged inconspicuously.

“Let’s not get too comfortable here,” you proposed, “Lorenzo, you must know the best brunch places for this late-waking city, yes? Let’s go out. Talk with your mother, too, I’m going to talk with Vang about some other things.”

As you went out into the foggy morn, you saw Vang looking behind her. “Oh, is nothing,” she told you, “Lorenzo’s girlfriend, ha ha.”

You didn’t see her, but you trusted Vang’s judgment. Especially when here, she would be unmistaken for anybody else. She hadn’t been permanently deterred. Good. You wanted to have a proper word with her. “So. Astrida,” you followed a few meters behind Lorenzo and Yena, Giacomo in his elder brother’s arms. “I know Naukland is a different place from Emre and Vitelia. It’s been Republican since before Anton Ange had entered history’s stage. Do you know anybody inclined towards the Dawn here?”

“Incline? Maybe.” Astrida said as she toyed with her prosthetic, “But…how to put, you know how you see two team of ball player and pick one to cheer for?”

You could already figure that out yourself, but you let her explain in proper detail. While Naukland was more liberally inclined in societal guidelines and structure than plenty of places, they saw the Dawn as a useful ally against the Reich- but not something welcome to change their own society. Additionally, since the Revolutionary Reds had been practically cut out of Emrean politics, anything too politically extreme was seen as distasteful to support over the milder current Emrean Republic, which was much closer to what Naukland was anyways. In short, you’d not find allies here, but you wouldn’t find enemies, either.

A shame, but what could you expect of Nauk? Naukland was probably the wrong place to look for individuals of that race who sought the Dawn, since they’d probably have quit of their ancient homeland when the inclination and ability came to them. They were a proud race, and not unjustifiably so. Unlike the pride of Vitelia, Naukland was at the head of the continent economically and technologically, and had suffered no ruinous wars for a very long time, instead profiting greatly off of the sale of the means of their execution.

The café was not too far, but already quite busy. Apparently, a favorite of the industrial workers who woke late to lessened daylight in some seasons, it spilled out over the surrounding town like a river burst from its shores. As would be expected of this part of Stor Ankomst- it was a city divided up into multiple districts, and beside the university, the locomotive nexus of the city also shared this district.

“Ah,” Yena sighed, “It seems we are too late.”

“No, we are not,” Lorenzo said calmly, “Their food is prepared ahead of time. They’re merely eating it and taking up mushroom coffee. The inside will be sparse and quiet enough. And the actual drink not made of dirt will remain untouched.”

“Is not dirt,” Vang said in objection, but coffee to you or any Vitelian was only made of one thing, and it wasn’t mushrooms any more than it was roasted barley.

A curious birdcall came from behind somewhere, and Lorenzo turned his head. “Ah…father, mother, Ms. Vang, go on, I want to go back and see something for a moment.”

“No.” You said firmly, and none would question the patriarch. “Go on. I’ve something I want to check myself.”

You knew that call well, after all, for it was one purposefully resembling that of a seabird that was much too far away from here to be of a true animal. Though the particular creature must have come from the same place. Indeed, you rounded the corner, and now, too close to slip away, you saw the startled eyes of the Comptessa Di Martellosa, though in seeing she was faced again, the fear turned to resigned contempt.

“Would you prefer to be called by your name, Irena?” You asked, “I thought myself polite in addressing you by your station. Like it or not, my son is your friend, or so he speaks. So there is no point in fleeing me, least of all for my blood.” You took a step back. “I do not mean to threaten you. But your presence here is extremely mysterious, and I’ve learned to be suspicious of such things lest my own blood be spilled, and I won’t tolerate that being done to my family.”

File: scene_70_seacountess.jpg (360 KB, 774x1200)

360 KB JPG

Di Martellosa bit her lip, clenched her fists, but relaxed them and looked down. “I mean you nor your house no harm. I had wished this meeting to have come when I had the advantage over you, but I suppose there is no need to hide my intentions. I did come here to be close to your son, Bonaventura.”

“This is a very expensive means to do such a thing.” You should know. “You’ve no interest at all in academics?”

“That was secondary,” she said defensively, “I will be plain with the truth. Since your fall from power, my position has been unstable. Maintained by the grace of the Red Prince. Yet times have been changing quickly in Vitelia, have they not? I am suffered for now, but at some point, I am sure that the Red Prince will see the benefit of having done to me what was done to the Duke Di Larencci. My lands may vanish with a stroke of pen. My coffers seized by the very Leagues that once purported to have no quarrel with me. All I am certain to have, and offer, are my body and blood. So I came here to offer them to the man who I have come to realize, is whom I have to thank for leaving me the rest at all.”

“Comptessa, is this truly the place to have this discussion?” You asked, “I am not considering deals right now. Only friendships. How the youth decide their future is not a power I want. All I want to know is if you two are friends or not. Then you can come along to brunch instead of skulking in the shadows like an urchin. You are certainly not dressed the part to be one.”

Di Martellosa smoldered at you, a frustration in her blue eyes. “What does it matter what he and I think? I am not more the free for my station, Bonaventura, and never have been. My fate was ever being decided by others from the moment I was born.” She was avoiding it, though, rather than outright denying feeling. “Whatever he told you is the truth. But the truth is not what decides matters of life nor state, is it? So I have come to your bloodline for shelter from what is to come. As would many others I have rallied whom lack friends in high places, which is what I offer.”

“Need you offer anything?”

“I do. I offer my hand in marriage to your son, Bonaventura. In exchange, your Legion will gain those who also seek shelter. At least one thousand along with the commitment of their remaining financial estate, though I know you are more selective than to take on every applicant. I had my servants seek that much out. If that is distasteful to you, then I would accept being granted a position of command, too.”

You looked around, making sure that court was still being held in an alleyway of all things, by a girl not much older than your daughter and just as cloud-headed in grander matters.

“Irena,” you dispensed with any titles, “You are attending school. Even if I allowed this, I could not make you a captain and also have you continue this education."

"My son would appreciate it least of all, and he would be the one to choose whom to marry at all.”

“He would not know of a deal,” Di Martellosa said, “And I would not fail. He is a…kind man, Bonaventura. Too kind. Too easy to ensnare even for one such as myself.”

“What of your desires, then?”

Di Martellosa curled her lip to maintain an air of rebellion, but her eyes went downcast. “What does that matter? My desires have never mattered. My own person does not matter save for that, until those with power deem otherwise soon enough, I have the King’s bestowment upon my house. Anyways. There are worse men to be betrothed to. Many and much worse, crueler and less fair for any noble blood or less. Besides. When given no other choice, do not wives learn to love what they have been given?”

On one hand, this was a ludicrous meeting. Caught out, instead of trying to hide anything at all, Di Martellosa had spilled her entire plan in hopes that it would entice you. Perhaps she had no confidence that you would see anything else as not being suspect, that you wouldn’t follow up on whatever story she gave regardless of truth. She was making the hasty decisions of the future that many a youth thought to do with an air of romance and finality, their short lives not weighted by worldly wisdom. By all rights, you should tell her to calm herself and simply do as she would be doing had you not arrived.

On the other. One thousand men, perhaps more, as well as their funding to equip them or better fit the Legion. She was right in that you doubted that they would have the fervor you desired, coming to you out of a sense of necessity and desperation rather than wishing for the Dawn, but even if only half could be made to look properly to the light, that would still be enough to fill out two new companies. In a time when expansion of the Legion was the most important part of fulfilling any future plans…

>What reason was there not to agree to this? The Revolution needed it, and your son would not have anything he did not wish. This was a completely conscientious deal, and a practical one.
>You could not promise your son’s hand in marriage, that was something that was his to decide. And you would rather not have this girl as daughter in law anyways. Yet you would shelter her- even if it meant placing somebody quite unready for command in the position of such…
>A bribe was unnecessary to you. Insist that it would be better to forget you’d spoken anything of this in the first place. If she wanted to be with your son, then let it be something natural, not a game where children were pieces to be moved over a board.
>No deals will be struck and no promises made. Lady Di Martellosa should be away from this place if her only goal was to take your son, because you would forbid it, no matter the rewards.
>Other?

>>6331827
>What reason was there not to agree to this? The Revolution needed it, and your son would not have anything he did not wish. This was a completely conscientious deal, and a practical one.
Sounds like a good deal, but we have to screen each and every one of the men she offers. Make sure none of them are loyal to the other powerholders and fuck us.

How much more betrayal can Bonetto take?

>>6331827
>A bribe was unnecessary to you. Insist that it would be better to forget you’d spoken anything of this in the first place. If she wanted to be with your son, then let it be something natural, not a game where children were pieces to be moved over a board.
Eh, two companies of fodder doesn't really interest me. Especially since re-education and fervor maxxing aren't something we handle directly with mechanic
If she thinks she can rizz up the boy, she's more than welcome.
Though, I'm personally partial to at least one of Palmiro's sons finding a nice wide of hip Nief’yem gal that unlike their mother has a mind towards the Dawn. That's purely personal preference though, rather than anything Benetto would probably care too much about.

>>6331827
>A bribe was unnecessary to you. Insist that it would be better to forget you’d spoken anything of this in the first place. If she wanted to be with your son, then let it be something natural, not a game where children were pieces to be moved over a board.
Honestly, while the legion needs the manpower, it needs manpower that truly believes in what it fights for. I'm sick and tired of compromising our beliefs, even if I know we'll be forced into situations where we are forced to. And honestly, I don't want to force a marriage pact onto our boy. And besides, if she truly wants to get find a place for all those souls, we do have some connections in Solstadt...

>>6331827
>You could not promise your son’s hand in marriage, that was something that was his to decide. And you would rather not have this girl as daughter in law anyways. Yet you would shelter her- even if it meant placing somebody quite unready for command in the position of such…

>>6331827
>A bribe was unnecessary to you. Insist that it would be better to forget you’d spoken anything of this in the first place. If she wanted to be with your son, then let it be something natural, not a game where children were pieces to be moved over a board.
>Say that you're not against them getting together.
I'm still in favor of them getting together and of us making a revolutionary princess out of her.

>>6331827
>Other?
She wants assurances, guarantees of safety from a marriage I do not want to force. If she can sway Lorenzo, then great, everyone wins, but in the meantime I think we can make her another offer.
Organize her people as another mercenary group under her ownership, but lease them to the Aurora Legion for now. She can keep a portion of their pay enough to secure a future for her and her people in case of the worst scenario. She can have more of her own choice in the future this way instead of being completely tied to us or her title.

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>>6331827
>What reason was there not to agree to this? The Revolution needed it, and your son would not have anything he did not wish. This was a completely conscientious deal, and a practical one.
>>6331836
>How much more betrayal can Bonetto take?

>>6331827
>What reason was there not to agree to this?

I'd say invite her along to brunch and let her and Lorenzo know that they have your approval to court, and if it works out then great, we'll have an alliance.

But we'll encourage them to finish their education. That saying about "Can't have thinking done by cowards, and fighting done by fools". But maybe trade trains for ships/planes (or underground trains to link islands with the underworld).

This is probably compatible with the "a bribe was uneccesary" vote, so that would be a second choice.

>>6331836
>>6332028
Give me your men, I'll give you my man.

>>6332035
...As above? I think?

>>6331851
>>6331868
>>6331895
You won't stand in the way of love, if that's what it is, but nothing else will be chained to it as a package deal.

>>6331874
Take the men- not the marriage. You've an eclectic mix of captains anyways.

>>6331918
Instead of incorporation, open a branch, and expand another way...

I'll be keeping this open some more hours, probably will call and update late tonight.

>>6331827
>What reason was there not to agree to this? The Revolution needed it, and your son would not have anything he did not wish. This was a completely conscientious deal, and a practical one.

We can send them out to Sosaldt with Third Company, maybe even keep them there long term after this underground business is completed since other anons have rightly pointed out the concerns about ideology.

>>6331827
>Other
Give her our blessing to court Lorenzo, if they get married we'll accept her offer as a dowry.

>>6331827
>>What reason was there not to agree to this? The Revolution needed it, and your son would not have anything he did not wish. This was a completely conscientious deal, and a practical one.

>>6332113
>>6332302
Two more for gimme.

>>6332244
A young lady should not put the cart before the horse.

Updating.

You wanted to tell Irena that she had no need to barter for what you believed should be given for naught, if both youths were interested in one another. A battalion as a dowry was an outmoded way of thinking, and no matter the blood or station, you’d deemed that if your children wanted to live their life a certain way, so long as it was not destructive, they’d be let to it. That their lives should unfold naturally, not be shifted about like they were pieces on a game board. The sort of fate that Irena Di Martellosa considered hers as a matter of inevitability and eternity.
Yet it was true that you needed allies and manpower in these dark times. True enough that there were those left outside of any factions or friends, and those in such places of weakness knew well how their lives might change or even be extinguished if they didn’t join with some sort of strength, and quickly. That you were considered such a lifeline was a great fortune, even if you’d have to tread carefully to be sure this drink was not poisoned. Irena did not seem to think it so, but when there were so many people involved, and their primary link was through a girl barely an adult, there were plenty of gaps for ill intent to slip through.

At the most basic level, also, she was reaching out to you for help, and surrendering herself into your guardianship. What was not conscientious about this, so long as you did not suddenly begin to treat your troops as fodder just because their numbers had risen?

“We have a deal.” You told Di Martellosa, “But I would not have stood in your way without your offer, so you know. I consider this mutual benefit unrelated to what happens.”

Di Martellosa swallowed hesitantly. “Is that a yes, or not?”

“It is. Though these are usually done with more than merely a word, do you have a document?”

That put the girl unexpectedly on the spot. “I…do not,” she exhaled, “I should have, shouldn’t I.” She put on a bitter face that her round cheeks couldn’t really make nasty no matter how hard she tried. “You must think me a fool.”

“I think you young and impulsive,” you said instead, “But I consider promises to not be made in falsehood. Consider the pact made, and then we can make it official properly once the time comes for your part of the bargain. Is that alright?” You extended a beckoning hand. “Now come along and let’s end high minded discussions of negotiations and alliances. My son wants to have brunch with you and introduce you to his mother. That’s a smoother trail than I had with my wife.”

Di Martellosa nodded, but when you made to step off, you looked back and saw her leaning against a wall, breathing hard.

“Pardon me,” she gasped and brushed herself off, “I just…was unsure what I would do if you did not agree…”

Despite her being a bratty, self-important relic of an antiquated system, you had a pang of pity for the girl. From her position, she thought she had no other good options, and felt forced to throw herself into things as this, which she seemed to have no experience in, for the sake of survival. From what Lorenzo said of her, she likely did not have close personal relations at all, let alone having experience with young men her age. It must have been terrifying to anticipate marriage as something that had to be engineered and made to work rather than something that happened as a matter of course as part of noble politicking.

You could only hope that Lorenzo’s familiarity with the light of the Dawn would draw her more sincerely to its warmth, as you knew it could do for so many, so long as they were not venomously cynical.

-----

Lorenzo must have been rather surprised that you were bringing in Irena instead of him, but the surprise of it passed quickly, since you and Yena had already seen her before. Your wife bombarded her with questions, apparently ignorant of who she was, as her queries centered on the domestic. Something you kept to yourself for now, since Di Martellosa wasn’t insisting on being treated differently, and it would only disrupt matters if Yena began to feel like she had to treat her like a Vitelian noble. The real surprise was that Irena answered: in repeated admissions that were sure to disappoint a highly experienced housewife. She had not dated before, she did not know how to cook, how to clean, nor sew or wash, and you could tell that the young noblewoman was desperate to claim that such things were beneath her, but perhaps she had long accepted the reality that nothing would be beneath a person who had nothing anyways. She did know how to dress well and do her makeup, clearly, and her hobbies included ship watching and…fishing…? Of a surprising variety of sorts considering her small frame…you’d think most fish would drag her into the water and eat her if they were put on a line. You cut Yena off before she could fully cut out a picture of a young pretty thing with nothing else to her as far as an ideal mate went.

The topic shifted to whether there were other green-hairs about. Yena hoping against hope that one of them might be a female suitable for Lorenzo, but no, he was the only one around, the only one he’d seen in Naukland at all. It was a curious thing to think about; Naukland was oddly empty of mountainfolk in spite of its lower half being full of good and dense peaks, and no part of the history you knew nor the tradition your wife knew had any actual explanation for it. Even the accounts of Sversk the Conqueror and his foundation and expansion of Nauk Imperial largely described the continent they settled as eerily empty, and accounts of mountainfolk at all were not found until the Empire had reached the western half of the continent.

Both Lorenzo and Irena were unique then, in being the only people of their race in attendance. The Nauk did not spite them for this, but they couldn’t help but be curious of them. Too bad for them that both of them were of a more introverted sort.

It wasn’t a school day today, this week was an off one, as planned out, so the lot of you went touring the local sites. Stor Ankomst was a huge city, and not a place that could be thoroughly toured in only a few days, but you decided to commit specifically to what would interest Lorenzo- and hopefully, the arranged bride you’d gotten him. The grand shipyards were not places that tolerated most tourists, but the museum ships were. An old ironclad that was one of the first seaworthy sorts floated gallantly in the bay, even as representatives of the Eastern Fleet menaced from across the water, intimidatingly modern warships of all sorts that were given the heavy responsibility of guarding the continent from invasion. Naukland loved such drama that the rest of Vinstraga did not particularly entertain, but even this fraction was admittedly fearsome. From far away, a battleship that was even larger than the ones that had won victories in the Vitelian Sea, accompanied by sleek bodied fast cruisers that looked like they cut apart the water even at anchor. A strange flat-topped titan the same size, that Lorenzo had told you was called a Fladehangarskib: a Fleet Aircraft Carrier. In the great expanse of the Eastern Seas, apparently, a floating airfield was a necessity, as the Maelstrom-ravaged islands seldom had permanent basing on them, and those that did were often in the territory of the fierce Sky Pirates that Naukland had no reason to provoke for their ephemeral holdings.

Yet such a craft would have little purpose in the Vitelian Sea, with its islands and lack of the sheer breadth of the oceans. No ship could carry as many aircraft as the lands around.

Yena wanted to leave a chance for Lorenzo and Irena to be alone with each other- but they’d have plenty of that anyways, as you were seeing Yena writing off Lorenzo as a loss for continuing any pure bloodline, such responsibility perhaps passed on to Luigi (who you doubted would comply). Instead, when you went to the sauna-baths for the evening, you went to them for their private space and gender segregation. Lorenzo had recommended the sweathouses for relaxation- and you were sure you had plenty to purge in them.

Sitting in the steam in little but a waistcloth, you and Lorenzo could thus speak of more secretive manners. Such as the war beneath Nuvole Blu and the Harzwohlkan civilization. It took some time to lay out completely, as well as emphasizing that he should tell no one. Lorenzo thankfully had some knowledge already of subterranean folk, but you had to reply that these were different. As far as you knew, equally pale, equally descended from familiar peoples, but their culture and technology were distinct.

Especially the latter, as you had people trying to puzzle it out. You fascinated your son with tales of the chromed machines humming silently on electrical power, a world of masks and scents and light, bluepowder dying the battlefields completely differently, the Stijder tanks and their complex articulation combined with curious strength.

Lorenzo did have something to say about that. “You said that they do not use internal combustion engines, right? Just electrical motors?”

“Correct. They might use them, but they’re not very common.”

“If they were they’d fill up the caverns with exhaust anyways…” Lorenzo dismissed that, “I don’t know of electrical motors we have that would be as strong as that, of that size…the power demands would be huge. Batteries don’t store that much…could you maybe…find one of their batteries and send it to me? That sounds like one of the big secrets. How do they generate their power, though?”

You knew that one. “They use geothermal plants that draw heat from the heart of our world, and that gives them a huge amount of electrical energy.”

Lorenzo’s mind seemed to be undergoing unseen but complex calculations. “A very small power storage unit could have so much potential…even if it uses special materials instead of particular construction…”

You had found out what he’d appreciate as a gift most then. You couldn’t speak much more on the underground than that, largely out of being unsure of anything further, but that gave you an excuse to move on to other matters of the future.

“So Lorenzo,” you said, leaning over and putting a hand on his shoulder. “About Irena.”

“Er.” Lorenzo cringed preemptively, seeming to sense the next subject.

“She seems like a decent girl. But don’t lose yourself, alright? You won’t be able to complete your educations and become wise and intelligent as you ought to be if you have to care for a grandchild. We don’t have to have that talk, do we?”

“No, I know, I know,” Lorenzo hurried along.

“Also,” you added, “Don’t stare down Irena’s dress so much.”

“Gh,” Lorenzo choked, “You saw that?”

“Everybody saw that. Including her.” Yet she didn’t say anything about it. “You should treat her like a lady. Has she told you her last name? It’s probably a false one anyways, to help her hide. Irena is Irena Di Martellosa, Comptessa of the Martello Isles and Il Rombo. She is a noblewoman, and while she is a better one for not insisting on being treated as such, remember that it wasn’t long ago that looking at her in a manner she deemed untoward could lead to you being flogged and jailed.”

“Oh. Oh.” Lorenzo fidgeted, seeming more put upon that he’d been caught doing something embarrassing than the other thing, which made you wonder if he already knew…

“So keep your nose out of her blouse when your father and mother are watching.” Even if she had already committed to far more, even if it was in a gradual future leading towards an already plotted end…

-----

You and Yena got some time alone later that night, as you left the babies with Astrida Vang and when to a bath house specifically for couples to get your jollies off. Suffice it to say, your wife was well satisfied this time, and she had a limp and a spring in her step both as you prayed that her appetite was sated rather than reignited.

Against any reasonable expectation, as you found out the next morning, but for now, things were at least in order as far as such functions went. A remarkably simple solution, but only if it wasn’t something that had to be repeated.

Passes for the university grounds had been procured next morning, and it was absolutely no mystery whatsoever who Yena was when she was close to Lorenzo, especially when bringing along his two little siblings who had equally green heads. Nobody was going anywhere secret, but you did see such things as metalworks, motor pools, and other such things that gave you a good idea of what Lorenzo was becoming. Which was somebody who might be more skilled with these machines already than much of your Legion. You might appreciate some graduates of this place to come and work for you, thinking about it, but Lorenzo wouldn’t be done for a few years yet.

Stor Ankomst was not a particularly pretty city compared to what one might see in Vitelia, but it had a humble quality instead of just being a mass of industry. It was calming to be in, if cold, and reminded you a bit of Gilicia, though certainly not of the ostentatious self-declaration of Emre. That was reserved for the museums, which held no shame in laying out every Nauk involvement in everything ever, even if direct interventions since the time of Alexander were rare.

No small amount of grand architecture, even if it was all in black and grey stone, was spared for glorifying the place of Sversk the Conqueror’s landing, even if the site itself admitted it was likely not where he first made landfall, but rather, where the first large wave of settlers set up this city. Nevertheless, the sculpture of an impressive longship conquering waves and Maelstrom alike and practically smashing apart the beach it first touched upon dominated a plinth overlooking the park, where a stern-faced, long haired and scale armored Sversk the Conqueror was stepping off, sword in hand and round shield in the other, a titan of a statue five meters tall which some might have believed was his true height if they looked at this recreation and not to history.

A small statue compared to the one in Republic Square, which depicted the rebirth of Naukland into its modern form. The first executive, the Princeps of the People of the new republican system, was immortalized as a twenty-meter effigy before the houses of governance, holding the marks of office of long axe and the codes of laws while dressed in the fashions of an aristocrat from centuries past. Despite the depiction being of a historical man, a curious quirk of the founder had led him to not lend his face to the depiction. It was said that he had given over the face of the statue to belong to a common tradesman- that any might aspire to become the leader of a modern nation. Whether that was true, men like you had good reason to be skeptical of, but it was a futuristic nation to not have a statue of a king taller than that of a common man.

By that day’s end, Irena had procured a proper document to seal with blood, scribed out meticulously in both curling handwriting and typed print in twinned copies, as well as a list of names and estates that would be seeking to join their cause to yours as a result of this.

“These are very well made,” you said, “Is this your venerable head servant’s handiwork?”

“No.” Irena said flatly, emotionlessly. “The day after your assassination attempt, he found out such news, and had a heart attack. He never recovered. Ever since…I have had to learn much I did not wish to.”

“My condolences.”

The noble lady trembled as she sealed her part with a blooded thumbprint, and stared at it when it was done. “There is no going back,” she declared in a quiet voice, “My father debased himself so that we might keep our name. Here I throw it away. But I would tell him…is Bonaventura a bad name to replace it with? I hope not. Though can I be blamed, for wishing I could have my islands? For thinking, perhaps, it would be righteous if your son might be prince of them? But that is not how the laws work now, and I doubt they would in the future…”

You had naught to say about laws or nobility, but you did try to reassure her. “When the time comes, it is Lorenzo’s choice, you know. Perhaps he would be Martellosa, instead of Bonaventura, if he thought it would make you happy.”

Irena stared at the papers still. “It would not be honorable to coerce him to toss out his blood and house for mine.” Perhaps she had grown more over the course of a year than you’d thought.

-----

Time to go back to Vitelia, then. Yena was happy, Lorenzo was doing well, the matter of your son remaining single for too long had been completely dealt with, and when you returned, you would have plenty to deal with again. No emergency communiques would have been able to be rushed to you, so you did anticipate the possibility of that…

…And were rewarded for it, even if it turned out to have been an expired emergency. Apparently, for an entire day and night, Ydela had gone completely missing. The Legion had been thrown into chaos as the search had failed to turn up anything, and suspicions of surface conspiracy began to be speculated on, but before anything could be acted upon, your palest daughter had reappeared in her bungalow, pretending as if there was nothing to be concerned about.

That was kept secret from Yena for now. You doubted Ydela would tell you why she had vanished or where to, but one thing was for sure- her guard detail would be getting reinforcements.

The research team and situation staff also would have their times, as not only were there developments to report and decide upon, but the Harzwohlkan Union was preparing its next move in the offensive, and had decided on a place for your particular attention based off of your Fourth Company’s extended operations. In the immediate moment, though, it seemed that a signal had been sent out ever since Irena Di Martellosa had been secretly betrothed to Lorenzo. A flood of applicants to the Legion had gathered on Nuvole Blu, practically enough to make their own floating city, though plenty more had formed an encampment on the ground. The hopeful allies to be, you presumed…though hopefully also, they would be of fighting age and have some sort of skills. Di Martellosa had implied, at least, that these households would not be made up of those too soft and high of expectations to be useful…

>Roll 4 sets of 1d500

Rolled 398 (1d500)

Bratty but not busty noblewoman wife? Close enough, welcome back Maddy.

>>6332451

Rolled 178 (1d500)

>>6332451
>>6332455
Uhhh let's try that one more time

Rolled 483 (1d500)

>>6332451

Rolled 242 (1d500)

>>6332451

As it turned out, one thousand was selling matters a little short. The final count of aspirants, including many who had been friends or servants of names rather than anticipated peoples (only one in five in the total seemed to actually be of the blood), was thirteen hundred and one. That last digit could be rounded off easily enough to one thousand three hundred. Almost as many as the Legion’s current battle line manpower. To put them all up as soldiers on the spot would double the Legion, but even at your most generous, you wouldn’t be doing such a thing. Further expansion in general necessitated an increase in administrative and supply office manpower, which would be the best fit for the academics amongst the bunch anyways.
The biggest cull would most likely be from loyalty testing, however. The Aurora Legion had been carefully raised up until now- it was extremely trustworthy, its soldiers not only well versed in Utopian literature and causes but also believers in what they were seeking to bring, even if some seemed to have differing methods or faith in the means. It had produced an elite unit indeed, but mixing cream with water only had one effect, and you had little idea of just how much loyalty and conversion of ideology you could count on from solely being the safe refuge. Especially when you were not offering luxury and comfort, but a shelter where one carved their place out in blood and iron.

Each plan to not dilute the Aurora Legion would necessarily involve culling more of these hopefuls. Where you’d put the rest, you didn’t know yet, but you did have the idea of having an auxiliary, brother mercenary unit that you could set off elsewhere when purity and resoluteness were not a chief concern. People to keep away from any battle for the Dawn, but perfectly fine to have elsewhere.

To be true, there were plenty of nobility and their associates who had recognized the world was changing, and so were already inclined to be taught just a little more to fit in with the others. They weren’t going to be any trouble. It’d be the others who were more doubtful or resentful of the future.

An exact census was ongoing, but thus far, it was easy to categorize the newcomers into three groups. The first was being called the Reds, a color naturally associated with Revolution since the beginning, and they were usually outcast for the reason that made them easiest to take in- Revolutionary fervor. They were not usually well off anymore, if they ever were, but they would easily meld into the Legion on a social level at least. At one quarter of the group, somewhere over three hundred, their numbers could readily fill a company and a half, but they were the least numerous while also being devoid of the necessary skills of mercenary work, and for some, the necessary physique either. A lot of work would have to be put into making them ready, though their minds and spirits were already good.

The second group was called the Golds, who were given the other color of Dawn, but they were not so inclined to ideology. Instead, they had brought a large amount of wealth in various forms, and hoped to perhaps barter some and keep a little. They would be immediately useful for this, but as far as their persons went, you could be less confident. Many weren’t suited for martial duties without training, and though the idea of fighting wasn’t anathema to them, you would be doubtful of their steadfastness long term. The Golds were two fifths, roughly five hundred, of the lot, and their primary appeal was that they could buy their own gear, and perhaps, that of others, but they wouldn’t be very enthusiastic for any but themselves.
Thirdly were the Greens, for the color of Vitelian martial wear, as well as the Legion’s, descended from that style. They were members of Household Troops, prior service that had somehow not fallen in with any present Militant Leagues or the Augustans, or those who were simply suited to disciplined violence with fitness of body and skill of arms. The utility of this bunch was obvious, but they were not Revolutionarily inclined. Like as not, they could be a mercenary anywhere, not just in the Legion, but for one reason or another they were here with you instead. Of the refugees, they made up another fifth, at two hundred sixty or so.

Those that didn’t fit into one of these three groups were those of academic or official temperament, and not expected to do any fighting, well, ever. This made up two hundred of them, and they were identified and noted down immediately for potential incorporation into expanded staff and support. The rest, though, you’d have to decide on how to sort out. A few plans had already been drawn up for you, but the Legato’s word was the final one.

>Much of these people were unready for any fight, and wouldn’t be doing anything but changing that fact. Organize the Golds and Reds into a reduced Battalion, four companies to be trained up and equipped at the expense of the former. Meanwhile, the Greens could be organized into another company for deployment much sooner.
>The best chance of making anything out of these people would be mixing them all together. Enough for a whole new battalion- with the leaders and trainers made from the Greens, to steadily make the rest battle-ready. They had all at least come from the same place, and could have some comradery out of the box that way.
>The Golds would be useless for much besides their money. Let them occupy themselves with the labors of camp if they must, and limit any role to a non-combat sort. They could fund the equipping of the Reds and Greens into three new companies, and would leave some funds left over for your disposal…
>Other?

>>6332489
>The best chance of making anything out of these people would be mixing them all together. Enough for a whole new battalion- with the leaders and trainers made from the Greens, to steadily make the rest battle-ready. They had all at least come from the same place, and could have some comradery out of the box that way.
Something something equality, something something animal farm.

>>6332489
>Other(Split the Reds into two groups, one that will be with Golds and the other that will be with Greens. Under no circumstances should the Greens and Golds be allowed to mix until adequate Revolutionary Fervor is beaten into them.)

If we allow the mixing of Greens and Gold it'll just lead to a reversion back to the old order of patronage and factionalism. Noble sons leading their "lessers" by the nose with promise of favors and wealth.
Disgusting. Not in our private military!
Reds, having the appropriate fervor to reject and correct the base impulses of both groups should be placed where needed in order to keep them separate and in line as to ease them into their re-education.

>>6332489
>The Golds would be useless for much besides their money. Let them occupy themselves with the labors of camp if they must, and limit any role to a non-combat sort. They could fund the equipping of the Reds and Greens into three new companies, and would leave some funds left over for your disposal…

>>6332489
>>The Golds would be useless for much besides their money. Let them occupy themselves with the labors of camp if they must, and limit any role to a non-combat sort. They could fund the equipping of the Reds and Greens into three new companies, and would leave some funds left over for your disposal…
Trading some manpower for more willingness to fight combined with potentially better equipment sounds like an ok tradeoff to me.

>>6332489
>The Golds would be useless for much besides their money. Let them occupy themselves with the labors of camp if they must, and limit any role to a non-combat sort. They could fund the equipping of the Reds and Greens into three new companies, and would leave some funds left over for your disposal…

Plenty of rearline roles for the Golds to fill in considering general tooth to tail ratios.

>>6332494
Supporting this,
By the end of their trainning Red,Green,Gold should all be Futurists ready to fight for the Dawn. Thats where most of our attention should be placed.

>>6332489
Also supporting >>6332494

>>6332490
Put the lot of them into one.

>>6332494
>>6332617
>>6332664
As above, I think, but with a more particular brand of intermixing to ensure preferred growth.

>>6332501
>>6332508
>>6332563
Liquidate the capital, and cull the numbers to the strongest lot.

I think I could decide it as the former by intent, but I'll wait a couple more hours before calling it.

Alright, going with the all in one plan.
Writing.

In the end, you’d be mobilizing the lot of just over one thousand into a whole new battalion of five companies, with a few gaps filled in with promotions handed to the first battalion to ensure some continuity of command, not the least because of a lack of qualified officers anyways. Though equipping the lot of them could thankfully be covered through their own financing, the questions of both ideological conditioning and practical training were not so easily addressed. Instead of trying to make a general mix of everybody throughout the unit, though, you ensured the separation of the Greens and Golds, so that the “glue” of the unit was the Reds, whose fervor you wanted to spread between the lot rather than what the others might reinforce in one another. Combined with the mandatory education and routine, while it would slow down training into an effective unit, it would better the revolutionary reeducation, by far the more important thing.

Even with the experience from the Greens, making a cohesive and competently trained unit from so much raw material would not be quick and easy. You and your training staff estimated at least six months before the new battalion was nominally a trained unit (and that itself was a rush job), with three months before it was reasonably battle ready at all. This would, most likely, mean Third Battalion (you anticipated 1st being split into two before this battalion was done cooking) would never see battle underground, or likely see field service at all until 1929, but you weren’t going to gamble away this windfall on something impulsive anyways. This was a time investment, and it wasn’t like normal recruitment wasn’t still going on, which would give you enough combat ready and motivated troops in the moment barring a terrible turn in fortune, given the lower intensity of the Harzwohlkan conflict for your people thus far than the Northern Wars had been.
>3rd Battalion is now undergoing conditioning and training. Further options for them may become available at the end of their initial training and organization period in three months.

Your budget had acquired some padding from the Steel Station job, but it wasn’t time to manage that yet, not until the next upcoming operation was done with, since that might produce yet more money for you. Instead, there were matters of Research and Development to address.
The Combat Seismometer had been deciphered in proper usage and a team of specialists had been trained to calibrate, maintain, and use it, at least unless it was destroyed or suffered a catastrophic accident.

The Research and Development Company didn’t understand quite how it was constructed yet, but it was not altogether that different in principle from known scientific equipment. For now, it had been repackaged into a more mobile and durable form by your artisans and sent up to your units at the front, where they might benefit from the new capability. One of the important discoveries of its use settings was the ability to apparently detect armored vehicle movement, such as tanks, or rather, casemates. Whether the Union had this technology, you did not know, but this was the first anybody was hearing of it.
>Combat Seismometer added to Headquarters Unit

The other important series of developments was concerning your Harzwohlkan captive. Not only had physical evaluations been made, but interrogations had been made concerning equipment usage, language, and common knowledge of the Sovereignty, even though military secrets were either unknown to the man or impossible to get without resorting to extreme and unreliable methods. The most important development was the development of Common Undergrounder Language Pamphlets, facilitating much easier communications between your troops and their allies and enemies both. This would also aid studies of technology through linguistic conventions. Indeed, the Combat Seismometer had greatly benefited from this simple breakthrough in comprehensions.

With little more being captured from the front, you didn’t have much new in the way of research options. That meant little since you had no shortage of potential projects anyways…

>With a R&D Company, you can effectively research 2 Complexity 1 projects or 1 Complexity 2 Project Alternatively, you can exceed this for slower gain, but cannot pick more than 2 projects.
>Harzwohlkan Close Combat Weaponry: The secrets of their clubs and blades, as simple as they might have been, would not evade you. (Complexity 1)
>Harzwohlkan Heavy Weaponry: Even if smaller Harzwohlkan weaponry was not so revolutionary, their larger munitions would reveal further secrets of metallurgy and propellant use alike.(Complexity 2)
>Wrecked Sovereignty Casemates: Despite being ruined, knowledge could still be gleaned from these. Especially regarding their unique suspension. (Complexity 1)
>Harzwohlkan Drugs and Combat Chemicals: Having discovered the basics of what went into them, with access to the environment of the Harzwohlkan, you might begin to discover particularly useful or exploitable medicinals. (Complexity 2)
>Other?

While the primary queries of the anthropological study had limited utility, they were admittedly fascinating from a perspective of curiosity about the unknown people.

A thorough physical examination was not the main goal of the anthropological study, but it was a necessary step, and told you some things the Harzwohlkan would likely not tell themselves. Certain things were an already observed quantity: the shorter height, stouter build, longer arms, and the light sensitivity, though it seemed that such could be acclimated to rather than being permanently crippling. The sun sensitivity was not the same story- though they actually seemed to be less so than your daughter was, but perhaps that was because Ydela’s condition was a more severe albinism, somehow…

A few other details came to light, from just speaking and casual conversation as could be had with a prisoner who couldn’t deny they were being treated decently. Harzwohlkan had difficulty growing facial hair, or body hair in general, with oily head hair and skin by nature. This extended as far as the eyebrows, thin and sparse by nature, and often drawn over with tattooing of various degrees of semipermanence, though in a society that often went around hooded or masked, such was seen as a personal expression not oft shown to many. Men were a little flabbier on average, but this was less from gluttony than it was that having a bit of extra weight was seen as masculine. The gap between Harzwohlkan men and women when it came to upper body strength was not so wide as it was with surfacers, so being thin was seen as feminine, the muscles on females not being so lean if they were developed well enough. This probably lent to the tendency to see a decent amount of such on the field, though it was also difficult to tell through thick clothing too. Dietary functions had changed too- their organs seemed denser, more suited to processing what was made underground. Amusingly, like a child might reject greens, Harzwohlkan seemed made ill by leafy vegetation, but nothing more than indigestion. Their scent and hearing were also improved to make up for their dark environment, and in passing, a “man’s nose” was trusted more than a “woman’s ears.” Men did tend to have larger nostrils, with the women, supposedly, having larger ears than would be normal on the surface, but you’d seen few of either to be sure. Hair color was as expected of albinism in some cases, but evidently, very light, sandy brown was known as well as white blonde and silver, and incredibly, the phenomena of red hair had been maintained, but faded into an inexplicable pink in an uncommon but natural form.

Most relevant for tactical purposes was the mechanism of their night vision. Or, since there was no night underground, dark vision would be more appropriate. Most of the Harzwohlkan, as it turned out, had no better vision in the dark than anybody from the surface might, but it was a different story for the martial castes. Recently developed surgical procedures combined with certain chemistry had resulted in the development of augmentation of the eyes that could be seen in telltale reflective pupils, often further augmented with another procedure that turned the sclera dark. This improved the eyes’ ability to take in ambient light, much like a night hunting animal of the surface, in exchange for making that eye nearer sighted and more sensitive to sudden changes in light, though these were usually mitigated by magnifying tools and reactive or shaded lenses. It was a significant improvement, however- yet not common enough for flares and floodlights to not remain a standard part of war for most. For those that could do without, though, they could be deadly indeed…

Most fascinating was that the eye augmentations were apparently not the limit of Harzwohlkan transhumanist sciences, though they did not refer to it by such a name. There was also apparently blood procedures, bone procedures, and more with effects on the body that could only be speculated upon, but even to your captive they were as good as rumor or even folk tale.

Folk tales such as the reason for current happenings at all, because as might be expected of the enemy, their take on what was happening was not the same as your allies’.

While the historical account of what had happened underground and what the war was over had never been steady and ever kept vague to you and yours, the captive’s account of what had happened included an important diversion in the canonical records. He was just one person, and could be lying or simply ignorant, but it was too great a difference to brush off. According to him, the Sovereignty was not the subject of a rebellion. Rather, when he spoke of his country, he didn’t even refer to it as the Sovereignty, but as the Union. The Sovereignty had long become the Union, as in response to pressure over a decade past, and the Royals of the Harzwohlkan had ceded much power to the Utopian popular leaders, even aiding in the implementation of their power structures…only to be betrayed by them and overthrown in a coup, disposed of like amputating a gangrenous limb. Overstepping their bounds and trying to reinvent society and culture then and there, a revolt had broken out and thrown them from the capital of Harzstadd. This was the war that had continued to this day, one where the Union was doing its utmost to restore itself to a position it had won peaceably, but lost foolishly.

Did that change your place in this? Not particularly. Not yet, if at all. You had no reason to think this moleman was any more truthful than your allies, and even if he was, the die had long been cast.

So. Back to the present, then, as you finished your business on the surface and was briefed on the coming major operation the Aurora Legion was set to take part in next.

The Harzwohlkan Union Army had made the decision to engage in an assault upon the settlement of Rookpoel, the same target you had your men pass over attacking early, though they had only decided to attack it just the other day themselves. Their command was simple- to cover the “east” flank of the assault, and push up the underground river to secure it against any potential riverine reinforcements. Thus far, the attack on Rookpoel had been a rather nasty operation, with progress being slow and bloody, and the Union Army was concerned that a counterattack might take advantage of the stalled urban assault. They expected one such counterassault on the “west” side of their pincer attack, as reconnaissance from fast-moving Fourth Company had revealed a relative mass of enemy armored forces there. The Union had moved their own casemate units, thirsty for battle against their direct rivals, to prepare for what was anticipated to be a great armored battle there.

The propensity for the Queen’s and Saints’ Army to fight trickily and to not do as it seemed was still given its proper respect. Thus, the commitment of whatever frontline forces you had available to this operation. The limit of your advance would be a large fishing village called Rogzpearen, which was also an important railroad stop newly made to aid the defense and also the site of a pair of small bridges which were also piers, unsuited to heavy war machines going over them but still a route of supply. Rogzpearen would certainly be heavily defended then, but barring other developments, it would be the ideal place to hold the line against any attack.

You were deemed to have what you needed to fulfill your objective, as a battalion of Union Citizen Guards, pressed to the frontline out of haste for reinforcements, had managed to secure the initial way forward as well as secure the flank of the direction of advance, with little resistance from the enemy. They’d not be of much use in the attack as second-line militiamen more conventionally used for guarding settlements and lines of communication.

The Aurora Legion’s contingent would be composed of First, Second, Fourth, Fifth and Mortar Companies, as well as a pair of Union Regulars, the Wolkmihnar that had been operating alongside since the Train Station assault. A reinforced battalion in numbers, practically speaking, as though the entire Legion were present save for a pair of them being replaced by mole men. Simple and straightforward- not even expected to be a difficult fight. You supposed the Union Army wanted the spotlight for this considering the rapid taking of the train station base was what knocked the Sovereignty on their heels enough to prompt this particular local advance this far.

Perhaps you should go down and observe yourself, place yourself near to command, or even take up the reigns once again..? Yes, yes, you’d be going there, undoubtedly. You were the Legato, and that title implied expectations were placed upon you. Ones you’d fulfill.

-----

>Update will continue, later, including operational map and such. Voting open for research though and will remain open for same length as update vote.

>>6332867
>Harzwohlkan Close Combat Weaponry: The secrets of their clubs and blades, as simple as they might have been, would not evade you. (Complexity 1)
>Wrecked Sovereignty Casemates: Despite being ruined, knowledge could still be gleaned from these. Especially regarding their unique suspension. (Complexity 1)

>>6332867
>>Harzwohlkan Drugs and Combat Chemicals: Having discovered the basics of what went into them, with access to the environment of the Harzwohlkan, you might begin to discover particularly useful or exploitable medicinals. (Complexity 2)

>>6332867
>Harzwohlkan Close Combat Weaponry: The secrets of their clubs and blades, as simple as they might have been, would not evade you. (Complexity 1)
>Wrecked Sovereignty Casemates: Despite being ruined, knowledge could still be gleaned from these. Especially regarding their unique suspension. (Complexity 1)

>>6332867
>Harzwohlkan Close Combat Weaponry: The secrets of their clubs and blades, as simple as they might have been, would not evade you. (Complexity 1)
>Wrecked Sovereignty Casemates: Despite being ruined, knowledge could still be gleaned from these. Especially regarding their unique suspension. (Complexity 1)

>>6332867
>>Harzwohlkan Heavy Weaponry: Even if smaller Harzwohlkan weaponry was not so revolutionary, their larger munitions would reveal further secrets of metallurgy and propellant use alike.(Complexity 2)

>>6332867
>Harzwohlkan Heavy Weaponry: Even if smaller Harzwohlkan weaponry was not so revolutionary, their larger munitions would reveal further secrets of metallurgy and propellant use alike.(Complexity 2)

>>6332867
>Harzwohlkan Drugs and Combat Chemicals: Having discovered the basics of what went into them, with access to the environment of the Harzwohlkan, you might begin to discover particularly useful or exploitable medicinals. (Complexity 2)

>>6332867
>Harzwohlkan Heavy Weaponry: Even if smaller Harzwohlkan weaponry was not so revolutionary, their larger munitions would reveal further secrets of metallurgy and propellant use alike.(Complexity 2)

I love big guns and I cannot lie

>>6332867
On the language point, have our scientists managed to determine the ancestry of the Harzwolkhan tongue? A descendant of Old Nauk maybe?

>>6333186
>have our scientists managed to determine the ancestry of the Harzwolkhan tongue? A descendant of Old Nauk maybe?
While there's some of that in there, the primary ancestor tongue appears to actually be Valstener, albeit of an antiquated form and mutated over time alongside something else uncertain. Valstener is not actually spoken on the continent anymore, though, even in the Valstens itself, outside of small use in slang and traditional terms, since Kaiser Alexander's cultural purges replaced the tongue of practically everywhere in his conquests with New Nauk, or Imperial, save for Emre. However, the Valstener colonial origin nations of Zeeland still speak their mother tongue.

It took over half a day for you to make your way down to your Legion. The amount of distance to travel alone was not insignificant, even if your passage was relatively free of administrative hassle. By the time you arrived, even though you had been expected ahead of time, there was a rush to pack up everything for a fight and move out. There’d be no time at all for you to, say, get to know the Wolkmihnar allies you’d be operating alongside. Only to meet with your officers and get a picture of the immediate situation, and trust them to know when you might inadvertently steer them wrong.

Not that the tactical picture was clear to anybody around Rookpoel. Not uncommon, but certainly not ideal. The terrain did not help that, as even before you drew close, there was a mist over the darkness that cast doubt over seeing anything at all beyond a hundred meters, and it was only signs and roads that successfully guided you and your escort to the front. Union Army Intelligence was, as had apparently come to be expected, an unreliable factor. They reported little useful ahead- a mix of militia and regular QSA units, as their casemates and other elite units were expected elsewhere. However, Captain Schoenbijter had a different opinion.

“They’ve got these tribal warriors, boss,” he confided in you, “Heard they’re called Verbaner, means banished, but they’ve thrown in with the Sovereignty. Most just call them Rangers. Nasty as hell, even though we never got into a fight with them, we could tell they’re relentless. They’re definitely around here, and I wouldn’t underestimate them. Especially since I’ve heard they get along well with the wildlife.”

“In what way?” you had to ask. “I’ve not seen much of it here.”

“For good reason. The deeper you go, the more unfriendly it gets, except to the rangers and their kind. Some say they mate with animals and they’re half beast, but,” Schoenbijter smirked and rolled his eyes. “They probably don’t take animal husbandry that literally. Ever try and screw a living stone, boss? I know you’re into breeding the mountain life, but I don’t think even you’re capable of that.”

Donomo Alga interrupted after that. “If you’re mixing jokes into your reports, then you’ve got too much time, Captain. Go get your unit ready for battle, we’re moving out soon.”

File: rogzpearen_oob.jpg (525 KB, 1500x1201)

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As the motor company officer sauntered off, you gave Alga an amused look. “I’ve heard far worse and not in jest, Commander.”

“Your officers should not speak that way to the Legato, signore,” Alga said, “I’ve given the captains and their officers their briefings already, but I will brief you as well. We don’t have much time before we’re to move out, so some of the details will have to be gone over as we operate. Though, signore, your experience speaks for itself, so I’ll try to keep it to a formality…”

True enough, though even your extensive record never took you to a place quite like this.

One peculiarity of the terrain had to be brought up, though it had been impossible to miss on the way here. Nearby Rookpoel was a great hot spring lake, which gouted steam all over the surrounding lands in a system that might be its own climate system as it whorled about hills and settled in depressions. Visibility was a variable thing, which made infiltration, as it had been sorely found out by both sides, remarkably easy. The one constant was that the high ground and away from water tended to be clearer, though the variability of steam density and how it was pushed about meant that it couldn’t be entirely trusted to hide either. With how open the terrain was, it was a risky thing to trust, but your men had longer range weapons in general. You actually held the advantage, thusly, in such an open match.

Mines were expected on the surface, but not so much here- until recently. Advancing this far, the Sovereignty had been caught unawares, but they had managed to lay down a few fields of area-denying traps. The Legion had learned how to tell where they’d been laid- sharp eyes caught their detonating mechanisms, not pressure, but filament strings swaying like spider silk, often difficult to see by the completely masked Harzwohlkan but Legionnaires could often spot them before they were in danger. Not that such made them less deadly to navigate, as the mines had been dubbed “Vipers,” for their mechanism of leaping out towards whatever unlucky soldier the trigger filament seemed drawn towards (yes, the filaments seemed to have minds of their own, somehow), before exploding into burning chunks of metal and blue incendiary. The unpleasant effects of this combined warhead made these minefields a particularly effective deterrent. The one positive note was that these filaments seemed to be drawn towards walls and objects as much as people- these fearsome mines were unlikely to be found in urban environments or in rough terrain like on the nearby hills.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_0.jpg (1.29 MB, 2000x1829)

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While the Union Army Command had only stated your operation goal was to seize and hold Rogzpearen, there was an added objective for extra pay, if you wished to pursue it. Across the river, there was the southern settlement of Vehrblaend right on the lakeside, and another called Rookwaeg on the hills. The former was already half-occupied by militia anyways. Taking each of these would provide you more compensation, though they were not expected to be easy targets, and holding them against counterattack would be more difficult than keeping across the barrier of the river. Considering any reinforcements you might receive would be sparse, it would be yet another gamble.

The Citizen Guards were meant to be securing forward positions for your arrival, and though you might bully them into helping further, they were not under your command- unlike the Wolkmihnar, who explicitly were leashed to you now. They’d likely have done the bare minimum, and anywhere beyond their line of advance would be unknown, even though the way up to there should have been safe. As a proper part of a prepared, if not formidable line, enemy artillery was expected to be present to some capacity. Your mortars might not be unopposed, if you were not careful, as though the Harzwohlkan disfavored heavy artillery like you might know it, they knew well enough the use of heavy mortars and pieces up to the size of your own were not uncommon, let alone plenty of more typical eight-centimeter bore size like that your infantry used.

The Legion was about to move out, as you looked over what the planned lines of advance were. Detailed plans rarely survived contact with the enemy, but these were what the initial moves were to be, whilst you had the initiative…

Main Objective: Secure and Hold Rogzpearen.
Optional Objectives: Secure and Hold Vehrblaend. Secure and Hold Rookwaeg

>Plan your initial positioning and movements. You may only begin up to where the friendly militia are deployed.
>Other actions/queries? Short ones only, you’ve not the time for a lecture.

There won't be an update on Sunday, it'll be a very busy day for me, so the entire day will be open.

>>6333257
>5th and the Wolkminhar across the bridge from Vehrblaend, every else along the road to Depot 8R.

File: plan 2.png (5.03 MB, 2000x1829)

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>>6333257
Forgive my childish scratchings please
Have 5th Company along with both Wolkmihnar Companies attack into Vehrblaend as quickly as they can. This attack should help prevent the enemy from focusing only on our attack towards Rogzpearen. When the town is taken we can decide whether it would be best to press on or reinforce the Rogzpearen push.

Have 1st Company and 4th Company push around Depot 8R, if I was in the enemies shoes I would mine the road leading into Depot 8R primarily, so I dont want to attack it head on. Based on how resistance looks we can attack the Depot from the flank or even push on to Rogzpearen directly.

2nd company gets to go on their own magical adventure on the flanks with the job to harass, skirmish, and generally support and screen from our right flank as needed.

>>6333257
5th and the 2 Wolkminhar should attack Vehrblaend.
1st 4th and 2nd should take Depot 8, and the have the mortars take the higher ground west of Depot 8.
Then 1st and 2nd should move for the main objective, with 2nd flanking from East and 5th moving to attack it from across the river. One of our allies should stay in Vehrblaend and one should assist the 5th.

File: modification.png (967 KB, 877x806)

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>>6333257

>>6333313
I'll do a slight modification on this, but otherwise I like it. For the initial movements (since we don't know where enemy units are) I'd suggest just moving the battle lines higher up.

On the right, the (red) assault squad can test the bridge. If it goes badly then they can cut their losses. Potentially if it goes well then the ally militia can move across the bridge to reinforce.

The two ally infantry (orange) can clear the center and take that small village. Potentially if it goes well then the ally militia can defend in that position and the line units could advance in the next turn.

Our motor team (blue) can advance on the depot from the left. The milita can defend our HQ (which hopefully being in the center can give warning about where enemy motor units are).

The raider team (yellow) can advance on the depot from the right (and the #4 milita can move up to reinforce/defent the depot).

This sets everything up to react to the enemy and/or continue to our goal. Generally though the ally milita should just be behind our line/assualt/infantry, and should help us defend against counter attacks if any (once we've taken over those urban sites).

>>6333561
This version of the plan I would support if the attack into Vehrblaend does not have enough frontage to handle the size of the initial attack with the additonal 2 Wolkmihnar Companies. I think the close quarters fighting suits them well there otherwise.

>>6333277
Rush the Depot, send the Moles and the Emrean to the assault.

>>6333313
As above- but maneuver to flank over greater spans of distance.

>>6333469
Split between each path.

>>6333561
Small mod for a more gradual effect of the first.

Alright, I can work with this, updating. Should be at a quicker pace after today.

Rolled 60, 43, 25, 11, 73, 75, 43 = 330 (7d100)

Oh, forgot this part.
This will be important.

As the unit moved up, yourself getting your share of marching in to remind you of how old you had become- though how strong you still remained- you noted one of the headquarters staff in constant communications with a Harzwohlkan aide, though the latter seemed to have little special equipment besides a special helmet that was pronged like it had horns.
“Who is that?” You asked, pointing them out to Commander Alga.

“Oh, that,” Alga said, “You might not have seen one of that sort before. They’re communications specialists. They don’t have radios or anything, but,” Alga realized he had to back up a moment. “So, wireless has obvious problems working down here. Instead, everybody uses this stuff called Filament. I don’t know exactly what it’s made of, but it’s cheap, flexible, and they use it basically like telephone cable. Except they can talk to each other through whatever that filament touches, usually their armor. If everybody could talk at once to each other, that’d get confusing quick, so the horn guys are the only ones with access to gold filament. That stuff’s the particularly sturdy stuff, and it means that the command channels keep clear. They have tiers of the stuff, but generally, if you want to get word about anything around, it goes fast.”

You had heard about the Filament technology before, but this was your first time seeing its specialists. The main advantage of Filament seemed to be ease of use- it wasn’t particularly secure, and already, you had heard of particularly crafty ways of it being used against those who thought it safe as it was simplistic.

The Legion was near the end of its movement forwards, when the sounds of battle began to snap out through the mist, though far away. The Filament Operator became extremely agitated, and babbled out updates to those around him (or her? The mask’s filter made it unclear).

“What’s going on?” You demanded at once, “That fire isn’t towards ours, is it?”

“No, boss,” Alga said immediately, “I can hear them talking already. The militia holding our forward positions are under attack. Seems we’ll be heading directly into a fight.”

Were it that such ordinary news was the limit. You were close enough that you thought that your allies would hold out in time for you to reach them, but it didn’t take long for panicked news to come up the chain, to you. The entire western flank of the forward positions had been wiped out, the only reliable information being deciphered, that of the cause of doom. One was a conventional sort of attack. Assault troops, referred to as “Penitent Brethren,” had surged from within the town of Vehrblaend and over the bridges without warning, catching the lax militia off guard. They were poorly equipped troops, but apparently overly kitted out for close combat and aggressive in tactics, being of some sort of religious order, with rumor having it that they also imbibed powerful drugs before battle.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_1.jpg (1.57 MB, 2000x2006)

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The other enemy encountered was merely described by terrified reports as “monsters.” Nothing else was relayed, besides that ravenous living stones had put to flight what hadn’t been ripped apart, and they were evidently accompanied by the feared Rangers you had been warned of. That…was an enemy unlike any you’d ever fought, if such was true. Living Stones of great size were fantastically hard to kill, you knew…though they were also often peaceful creatures. What ones somehow coaxed into war would be like to fight, you didn’t envy those who had to find out.
>MONSTER Units are durable against those without heavy and/or armor piercing weapons, and extremely deadly in close combat. It is better to not be caught by them in such an environment.

Further up the line, your allied militia had not been destroyed, but were badly battered by another sort of Rangers and were frightened out of their defensive positions, and into First Company’s way. As far as you had been briefed, they wouldn’t be too different in tactics from your Second Company- light infantry better suited for skirmishing and scouting, but plenty deadly in a straight up fight too.
>RAIDERS default to fighting in SKIRMISH STANCE, where they deal less damage but also take less of it too, and have significant damage reduction in such a stance. However, if caught in close combat, they will suffer great penalties in Skirmish Stance. ANY UNITS may take up Skirmish Stance, if they so choose.
>ASSAULT STANCE may also be taken up by units, which DOUBLES their movement, but at the cost of making them more vulnerable to attack at a distance. However, if they close the distance to their foe in the same turn, they automatically enter close combat without having to take fire before.
>Default stance is LINE STANCE, which has no particular advantage or disadvantage.

Your men solemnly prepared for battle even back here, though your actual frontline companies were far ahead. It seemed the enemy would not be underestimated in their moment of surprise. As for you and the headquarters’ part, it seemed like it was time to either adjust plans- or advise to stick to them, depending…

>What are your orders?
Sorry that this one's a bit rushed out, but I figure it was better to get started than delay for later tonight.

>>6334127
Well that plan fell apart pretty much instantly.
New plan, those crabs are going to roll us up if we let them, have our 1st and 4th companies swap places with the Wolkmihnar Companies and do their level best to support 5th company. Have 5th company try to pull back as much as they can to get within range for the 1st and 4th to support them, but they may be in for a fight. The mortars sole job is going to be supporting the 5th company now, they are big but they are still just animals, if we cannot easily kill them we may still be able to spook them.

Have the Wolkmihnar Companies move up north in SKIRMISH STANCE and hold up the Rangers there. 2nd Company will hold the other Ranger company in the east. I would bet those enemy forces intend to hang around and bait some units to attack in ASSAULT STANCE before pulling back and having some other hidden units lay into their attackers, so they are not such an active threat right now.

If all goes well 4th company has the speed to be able to double back to help the Wolkmihnar push north still but 1st and 5th company are probably going to have to stay to at least screen the west flank, if not continue the push to secure the flank at Vehrblaend

>>6334127
>>6334185
+1

yeah loosing two allied units before we even get started is a bit rough and puts us on the back foot.

rushing into the fog seems like a great way to die

>>6334185
Supporting

Rolled 19, 80 = 99 (2d100)

>>6334185
>>6334228
>>6334388
Adjustment to avoid getting crabbed.
I don't know if the cloudflare interference is making things harder for some people, but I figure this is a solid enough consensus anyways. In any case, I'll need 2 rolls of 1d100.

Rolled 28 (1d100)

>>6334459
The dice decide.

Rolled 45 (1d100)

>>6334459

The initial engagement seemed a terrible ambush, but as the first moments passed and the shock of the turn of events faded, an observable reality came back from the front. The enemy was not expecting your arrival either. 5th Company had braced for a charge by monstrous beasts and your other units had moved to support them, but no assault came: the beasts had slipped back into the mists and out of sight, which in its own way, was worse than them attacking. Meanwhile, the Wolkmihnar and your 2nd Company skirmished with the fearsome Rangers, and though they held them back, they made no progress either. 2nd Company was having the better of them gotten, but because of the loose stances and skirmishing involved, even drastic foul-ups were of limited damage, though the tiny damage your allies were suffering was telling of one thing- their armor, light as it was compared to the elite, was incredibly effective at casualty reduction, at least by the enemy weapons here.

A report on your militia allies had been hurried on the spot to Alga, and he shared the information with you. Half of your allies had been obliterated, either put to flight, carted off, or slain, though largely in disorganized flight. They hadn’t been expected to do more than defend anyways, but this still meant that their positions would have to be retaken. The other half of the Citizen Guards battalion remained rather intact, however- they might be useful, at least to prevent an attack from being flanked without warning.

A prompt response came from Union Army command at this news. A rarity, from Alga’s reaction to it. Reinforcements were being hastily sent on the way, however, by the time they arrived, the enemy would also have reinforcements. Considering their likely numbers at this point, this meant that friendly reinforcements were only likely to help you hold what you took, rather than aiding your capture of the objectives.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_2.jpg (1.66 MB, 2000x2000)

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Alga was already coordinating with the captains, preparing his plan of advance, though it was based on what had been made before. The enemy wasn’t going to just move out of the way, and you had a mission to fulfill. The only real change seemed to be having the mortars put on standby early, already prepared to fire even as their crews were still unpacking the rest of the shells besides the emergency barrage they carried immediately to hand.

You might interject, of course, as Alga would defer to you, but he was acting from well experienced instinct now, so he hadn’t bothered to ask you to think for him. Good for him.

>RANGER ENGAGEMENTS
>Break contact to try and lure them out of position, skirmishing with elite light infantry would only slow you down, and they were already deadly enough at their own game.
>Advance to close combat. You needed to be rid of them, and trying to beat them at their own game was not going well.
>Continue the current tactics- all you needed to do was keep them at arm’s length so your other troops could operate without molestation.
>Other?

>WESTERN FRONT
>Advance as planned. You had the numbers to fight the monstrous unit if they insisted on it, and you had to seize the initiative again.
>Advance slowly and carefully, and spread out. You didn’t know enough to act decisively yet- better to feel out a good position before a reckless assault.
>Shift your entire attack direction elsewhere. Assaulting Vehrblaend, a secondary objective, did not seem wise right now.
>Other?
Also-
>Pick a target for your mortars?
>Any other actions/plans?

>>6334565
>RANGER ENGAGEMENTS
>Advance to close combat. You needed to be rid of them, and trying to beat them at their own game was not going well.

>WESTERN FRONT
>Shift your entire attack direction elsewhere. Assaulting Vehrblaend, a secondary objective, did not seem wise right now.
It has become increasingly clear that splitting up with fancy plans is not going to work. Everyone is going north all together. No one is going off on their own to get picked off.

>Pick a target for your mortars?
Hit the Rangers directly north of our Wolkmihnar on the road.

>Other?
Some questions for tanq, how do the units with extra motor movement work? Do the 4th take a turn to mount up or dismount, or can they move 250m and attack as normal? Do the Mortars also need any turns to mount up or dismount to be effective again?

Anyone ever fight the Wood Elves in Total Warhammer multiplayer? This is going to go like that.

>>6334590
+1

>>6334565
>Break contact to try and lure them out of position, skirmishing with elite light infantry would only slow you down, and they were already deadly enough at their own game.

>Shift your entire attack direction elsewhere. Assaulting Vehrblaend, a secondary objective, did not seem wise right now.

>Pick a target for your mortars?
As per >>6334590

>>6334565
Supporting >>6334590

>>6334590
> how do the units with extra motor movement work? Do the 4th take a turn to mount up or dismount, or can they move 250m and attack as normal? Do the Mortars also need any turns to mount up or dismount to be effective again?
I've thought about this and decided, no, they can move and attack as normal, since motor guys don't get special benefits outside the vehicular movement and I figure they don't take long at all since they're well trained and adapted for it, though that's only over terrain that allows for that sort of speed (so nothing rough, or like, uphill). Heavy weapons do need to set up and properly mount, though.

>>6334565
>Break contact to try and lure them out of position, skirmishing with elite light infantry would only slow you down, and they were already deadly enough at their own game.

>Shift your entire attack direction elsewhere. Assaulting Vehrblaend, a secondary objective, did not seem wise right now.

Never mind Vehrblaend, lets go take the Depot.

Mortat support should focus on the line indantry of the enemy, we should lure the rangers in.

>>6334590
>>6334609
>>6334668
Try to close with the enemy, shift northwards, and mortar those rangers.

>>6334667
>>6334747
Instead of going at them, don't play with this bunch.

Updating, but in the meantime, give me 3 rolls of 1d100.

Rolled 62 (1d100)

>>6334798

Rolled 12 (1d100)

>>6334798

Rolled 94 (1d100)

>>6334798

Rolled 67, 46 = 113 (2d100)

Probably should do these at the time of asking for them.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_3.jpg (1.64 MB, 2000x2000)

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Captain Ornelli wasn’t a renowned piece of the Legion. He had been a fat bodied bespectacled mathematician once, though never good enough to find employment when he needed it. Such had driven him to Vitelia’s artillery, and eventually, to the Aurora Legion, when he grew dissatisfied with what he fought for in Gilicia. Who might have thought that he would fight under a former enemy? Though perhaps, the enemy had been the other direction all along.

No matter. Here, as far as he was concerned, the allegiances were clear. The Legion on one side, the enemy on the other, and his pneumatic mortars snapping their payloads out, a deadly delivery service. Only, the troops whose attack he was supporting now were molemen… bah, they all blew up the same.

Meanwhile, though the artillerists were not being interfered with, another part of the Legion was skirmishing fiercely with Harzwohlkan rangers for control of the initiative.

“Captain,” Walt’s second in command Horak said as surprisingly withering fire came down the hill and through the mists to 2nd Company, in loose formation but scrambling to whatever little cover was offered by the ripples on the hill, “We’ve not fought anybody like this in years, have we? Besides our own?”

“Tribesmen turned soldiers,” Waltz mused, flinching as a marksman’s bullet snapped overhead when he relaxed for a moment. “I’m getting angry, Lieutenant. Being shown up by foe after foe. It hurts a Fealinnese man’s pride, doesn’t it? What does the world think we are?”

“I think we should show them our sleeves, Captain,” Horak said, “Command seems to think so too.”

“Then we shall.” Another blue-traced line flicked by. “Send out the order to charge!”

-----

The attack could very well have gone poorly, but fortune and skill were on your side this time. The barrage from your mortars was reported to have caught the enemy quite off guard. A benefit from their pressured air power not giving off nearly the report a conventional weapon might, and even not sounding like a weapon at all if it was heard. As the enemy rangers prepared to receive the assault of the Wolkmihnar instead of skirting away from it, they had been struck hard, disrupted, and as your allies attacked, punished ruthlessly, send retreating northwards. They had exacted a toll from your allies, but all in all, the reports considered it a good result against superior troops.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_4.jpg (1.64 MB, 2000x2000)

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2nd Company had not done nearly as well, but they had charged uphill against an enemy unprepared and, while not destroying them, had compelled them to abandon their position for the safety of the mist pools rather than stay and fight things out. You had regained the upper hand, for now, but with the battlefield such an uncertain place, who could say what might happen next? You had to stay on your feet.

“Commander, Legato,” an adjutant rushed over, “We’ve established Filament comms with what’s left of the 32nd Citizen Guards. It sounds like they have been officially placed under our command for this operation. Our eastern flank should be covered by a parallel advance outside of our combat zone, but we’re told that we can’t be too careful…which probably means to expect the unexpected.”

That would let you fill in some potential gaps in the line- even if you knew better than to trust them to hold against any assault by quality troops.

>NORTHERN PUSH
>Fan out your line and try to surround Depot 8R’s southern face before attacking. You had time, and you wouldn’t enter an urban fight unready.
>Keep the initiative while you grasped it. Have all companies advance as quickly as they could, even if it meant a disjointed attack. Speed would prove a better ally than fancy tactics.
>Widen your front again while maintaining a north-facing posture. You were getting too crowded here, and you had more than enough troops to not need to commit them all to a single target.
>Other?

>ALLIED MILITIA
>Have the Citizen Guards cover your east and west flanks both. Even if they fell, they would at least give advance warning.
>Move all the Citizen Guards to protect your western flank. It was the most vulnerable right now- and where the most enemies might be found, so they’d need their whole number.
>Cluster the Citizen Guards around your headquarters and mortars. The most important thing they could do was directly protect the support and command apparatus.
>Other?

>>6334954
>Widen your front again while maintaining a north-facing posture. You were getting too crowded here, and you had more than enough troops to not need to commit them all to a single target.

>Move all the Citizen Guards to protect your western flank. It was the most vulnerable right now- and where the most enemies might be found, so they’d need their whole number.

>>6334954
>Widen your front again while maintaining a north-facing posture. You were getting too crowded here, and you had more than enough troops to not need to commit them all to a single target.
>Cluster the Citizen Guards around your headquarters and mortars. The most important thing they could do was directly protect the support and command apparatus.

>>6334954
>Widen your front again while maintaining a north-facing posture. You were getting too crowded here, and you had more than enough troops to not need to commit them all to a single target.
>Move all the Citizen Guards to protect your western flank. It was the most vulnerable right now- and where the most enemies might be found, so they’d need their whole number.

>>6334954
>>6334962
+1

>>6334954
>NORTHERN PUSH
>Widen your front again while maintaining a north-facing posture. You were getting too crowded here, and you had more than enough troops to not need to commit them all to a single target.

>ALLIED MILITIA
>Have the Citizen Guards cover your east and west flanks both. Even if they fell, they would at least give advance warning.

All for widening the front. As for the militia...

>>6334962
>>6335013
>>6335067
Concentrating them westwards.

>>6334978
Keeping things tight and neat.

>>6335075
Maintain the balance.

Updating.

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The orders to broaden the front were given out- and you expected an interruption, a spoiling attack, but when you broke off your attacks, the enemy seemed to, as well. As the battalion reposition for its new focus, and the Union Militia nearby similarly marched west, you asked Alga what he thought about the enemy’s lack of immediate action.

“There’s probably a lot more of us than they expected, boss,” Alga said, “Last we ran into them, we had our white coats on our side, but we didn’t have Schoenbijter’s people. There’s more of us on the line now than ever, and the militia were here too. I think they’re just adjusting. There’s too much defensible terrain ahead, and there’s more of them than we were expecting too. They’re probably pulling back to buy time to hit us later, since that initial strike didn’t knock us off balance.”

A look around you- without a tent, you both felt more aware, and more vulnerable, especially with a certain development in the weather. “Is the mist getting thicker?” You asked.

“Yes,” Alga nodded, pointing to the lake, “There’s bursts every so often, of steam vents. It comes and goes quickly, but it cuts our visibility pretty badly. Before, you could count on seeing about three hundred meters…when things are lit up proper, at least.” The darkness was of a sort in this weather that made things even darker than usual save for where flickering lamps and floodlights cast their gaze, or where launched flares still glowed above, light balloons where vision was necessary but the enemy was clear. Settlements still shining with their street lights rather than being blacked out, a testament to the suddenness of this battle.

“They’ll take advantage of this, surely,” you noted.

“Probably,” Alga agreed, “But they can’t see in this any better than we can. So we can take advantage too. Though it’s definitely hard as hell to see vipers in this fog, and they definitely have them planted on the easiest approaches.”

You looked out to the soupy fog, rippling like a winter storm. You’d say you couldn’t imagine fighting in that…but you had fought in that. Directed others to. And knew it was very dangerous, but also an incredible opportunity, in any war where the range of firearms dictated the flow of battle so strictly…

>Make a broad front advance, utilizing the fog. If the enemy wasn’t striking first, you’d do it for them.
>Only maneuver a few units forward. The rest should hold back in defensive posture. (Which Units?)
>Keep the battalion held back, and prepared for an attack. The enemy knew this terrain better than you- they very well could have been waiting for this to happen, and would know how to use it better…
>Other?

>>6335109
>Keep the battalion held back, and prepared for an attack. The enemy knew this terrain better than you- they very well could have been waiting for this to happen, and would know how to use it better…

>>6335109
>Only maneuver a few units forward. The rest should hold back in defensive posture. (Which Units?)
Have our 5th and the Wolk 3rd move up together to that hill to the north to get into position to attack Depot 8R from the west, and have our 4th and the Wolk 4th move up to assault the Depot from the south.
Hold the 1st back for now, but I have a feeling they will be needed on the eastern flank soon, and hopefully the 2nd will have a good position to support from that hill over there.

>>6335109
Supporting >>6335144

>>6335144
Supporting

>>6335120
Hold back- and see what happens, rather than risk the worst.

>>6335144
>>6335149
>>6335178
Form the start of a pincer- but don't forget the base.

Updating.

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If the enemy was going to take advantage of this weather, so would you. Movement would be like crawling on hands and knees, practically underwater, but you weren’t about to wait for the Sovereignty to act while you sat still. Some of your line would assume solid defensive positions, but the others would advance forwards and out, to envelop the supply depot that stood in the way of your main objective. Not a military depot though, at least not originally. It was a vast agricultural storehouse for local farmlands, and even now, there were apparently farmhands still trying to harvest whatever they could get at. None here. The fighting was too loud and recent for even the foolhardiest to dare.

Naught happened as the orders were relayed and confirmed, and the mist remained thick. There was some valuable time for talk. “Commander Alga,” you addressed your trusted officer, who had been in charge of the Legion’s field operations since its creation, “If you were our enemies in the Sovereignty right now, what would you be doing? I know this war far less well than you.”

Alga was quick with his response. “The Sovereignty’s not to be underestimated, boss. The Union isn’t any good about admitting their enemies’ strength, or their weaknesses. The Sovereignty’s got good officers, good leaders. Their equipment isn’t as good and their army’s a mess when it comes to any idea of identity, but as long as their officers can keep them together, they put up a good fight. That’s why they surprise the Union so much. Why we’d best not treat them like fools. If I were them, I’d be doing what we’re doing, but putting off a pitched fight until I’ve gathered enough forces to sweep us all away at once when the mist is clearer.”

“Do they have the forces for that?” You asked.

“Don’t know, but there’s more of them than we expected. If they launched a counterattack alongside what the local defense was supposed to be, they could try it. It’s their standard tactic. Don’t take fights unless they can trap you, concentrate where they’re not expected. With their conscripted militia, they can’t always execute those tactics very well, but so far we’ve not been fighting militia. Which means this is a battle they’re taking seriously.”

News from an adjutant. Enemy contact, in the fog…

-----

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Captain Dulechamp and his red-tunic brethren were antsy for a fight. The assault on the Steel Station some days before had been a good rush, but there hadn’t been much challenge in it. The molemen he was operating alongside seemed to agree- there were little songs to sing about easy wins. Here and now, though? It was no weary conscripts or peak-capped linemen that opposed the Legion, but some of the fiercest that the underground might hurl towards them. What the Wolkmihnar revealed to be called Fehlsten Rangers and Verbaner Rangers, two militant forces of tribesmen from the deep caverns. They sounded to Dulechamp rather like the Yaegirs of the surface, bloodthirsty wild men who leased their battle skill to those who offered them the chance to fight, though Yaegirs certainly were no tamers of beasts. Alongside, it seemed, were fanatics of the Church.

When Dulechamp had wondered what church might be followed down here, when he had first arrived, there was a somewhat surprising answer. The Cathedra, though there was no contact with the establishment of the surface offices of it. The Saints had some additions, but otherwise, it was a near identical faith. Such was not adhered to by the Union, by law. The only faith allowed was that of the Future and Enlightenment. An interesting concept- though Dulechamp admittedly felt that might be much for a people used to the Cathedra to swallow at once…

Movement ahead- the assault troops stopped. Shadows lumbered ahead in the mist, a similar halting; the two opponents on this field had unexpectedly run into one another.

A filament transmission came from the east- the Wolkmihnar had also encountered the forward elements of an enemy, these ones the talisman-laden Penitent Brethren. If there was to be a fight, it would practically be guaranteed to be an ugly close-quarters one- but if anybody could take it, it was Dulechamp…

>Take this fight that had been offered up by fortune. Victory to the bold!
>Withdraw, and hope the enemy does not catch you. First Company was not so far away, but they could not help you unless you were close to hand.
>Other?

>>6335372
>Take this fight that had been offered up by fortune. Victory to the bold!
Not ideal, but it looks like they may be able to collapse on the molemen and take a bite out of them for free if we run.

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>>6335372
>Take this fight that had been offered up by fortune. Victory to the bold!

>>6335372
>Take this fight that had been offered up by fortune. Victory to the bold!

>>6335372
>>Take this fight that had been offered up by fortune. Victory to the bold!

Rolled 11, 29 = 40 (2d100)

>>6335392
>>6335393
>>6335417
>>6335430
It isn't very Emrean to run away or surrender, is it?

Roll 2 sets of 1d100.

Rolled 90 (1d100)

>>6335437
Come one Dulechamp, scion of the Dawn

Rolled 41 (1d100)

>>6335437

File: RogzspearenOffensive_7_2.jpg (1.87 MB, 2000x2000)

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Was there truly another option to an Emrean? To a Warrior of Dawn, no less? Would the Future come if he and his fellows balked at fighting monsters? Heavens, no.

“We attack!” Cried Dulechamp, raising his submachinegun. "Follow me forth, unless you wish to die forgotten!" The monsters’ guides were plenty human, all armor had weak points, and besides that, Dulechamp doubted that any mere beast could withstand explosive charges and anti-tank rifles, even if his unit only had four of those. He charged forth, into the mist, and his men would surely follow him rather than be shown up by a foreigner…

-----

“Damn,” Alga grit his teeth, “I hope you weren’t attached to Fifth Company, boss.”

“Actually,” the adjutant butted in, “Captain Dulechamp says that he’s winning. That his unit’s carving them apart like a blade through pumpkins, as he put it.”

Alga choked at that. “Just what sort of fairy tale does he think he’s selling? Is he slaying a dragon as well? Pointing to his cock and saying he’s a donkey down there when the only jackass piece of him is above the waist.”

The adjutant shook his head still. “But Dulechamp doesn’t lie, does he? He would at least admit if he was taking great losses, but he’s reported nothing of the sort. Even said his men haven’t a scratch upon them.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” Alga scowled, “What of the Wolkmihnar?”

“Holding against Penitent Fanatics, it sounds like. They’re better equipped than their enemy, but in this sort of fighting, they’re not at an advantage. The Union might call the Penitent drug addled madmen, but they’re trained in assault tactics and close combat fighting as well as any stormtrooper.”

So the battlefield, all in all, was in your favor. Fourth Company had reencountered the Rangers on the eastern side, but there were no other new battles cropping up. So- it was time to react to this, then.

>Commit to the attack wherever possible, if all was going well. It would be foolish to do otherwise. (Remain in battle, and move to contact where possible for those not engaged)
>Better to break it off while the going was good. Withdraw to First Company in the west, and avoid battle in the east.
>Take advantage of the enemy being engaged- trust Fifth and Third to fight off the enemy, and have everybody else focus on maneuver (How so?)
>Other?

>>6335493
>Commit to the attack wherever possible, if all was going well. It would be foolish to do otherwise. (Remain in battle, and move to contact where possible for those not engaged)

>>6335493
>Commit to the attack wherever possible, if all was going well. It would be foolish to do otherwise. (Remain in battle, and move to contact where possible for those not engaged)
Whack a mole

>>6335493
>Commit to the attack wherever possible, if all was going well. It would be foolish to do otherwise. (Remain in battle, and move to contact where possible for those not engaged)

>>6335493
>Commit to the attack wherever possible, if all was going well. It would be foolish to do otherwise. (Remain in battle, and move to contact where possible for those not engaged)
Lets not give the beasts a chance to ambush us later, finish them.

>>6335500
>>6335504
>>6335522
>>6335555
All in on continuing the fight, wherever possible and as quickly as you can.
Give me 4 sets of 1d100

Rolled 71 (1d100)

>>6335584
rollan

Rolled 95 (1d100)

>>6335584

Rolled 17 (1d100)

>>6335584

Rolled 46 (1d100)

>>6335584

Rolled 15, 57, 96, 88 = 256 (4d100)

>>6335585
>>6335588
>>6335589
>>6335644
Alright, let's see how this shakes out then.

Rolled 29 (1d100)

Gotta do one more, as it turns out- as per internal mechanisms.

I've also miscalculated the number of rolls I needed as well, somehow. Give me another 1d100, please.

Rolled 99 (1d100)

>>6335659

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>>6335661

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“If we’re winning,” you said, “Then let’s keep doing it. Order all units to continue battle, and if they’re not in a fight, to find one. We’ll see how the elite of the Depths compares to the might of the Aurora.”

“Si, Signore,” Alga saluted resolutely. Whenever you said things, people rarely doubted the words that left your mouth, and the Legion was even more so. All you hoped for was that your poor battlefield luck would not persist after all the unluckiness over the last couple years…
However, though the fighting from afar was fiercer than you’d heard the like of in years, echoing all about and making phantom battles in all directions, favorable news was what returned from the front. The ongoing battle of the 3rd Wolkmihnar and 5th Company against their foes had seen further success, and the flank was turned- first company entered combat with a straggler group of rangers, and though they had been surprised, their better numbers gave enough of an edge to make the fight inconclusive in appearances, bloody in toll, but tactically speaking, it was the final nail in the proverbial coffin. The Sovereignty’s flank, brutalized, absconded into the mists.

To the east, the 4th Company of yours and of Wolkmihnar encountered more rangers again- and though they put up stiff resistance, the numerical odds took their toll, and they were forced to retreat as well.

There was little celebration as casualties were counted- not because the share doled to you had been severe, no, but because even in the moment of victory, any veteran knew it might be fleeting. Even the relatively green Wolkmihnar were quiet, perhaps out of fear of the enemy they had turned away, the rangers being far superior to the force that had ruined their unit in their first battle. A good sense to keep, as headquarters staff had yet more news for you.

As the first field usage of the new Combat Seismometer, there were teething troubles in figuring out its exact function in battle and what to look for, but now, a reliable report was coming. The vibrations indicative of casemates, in the direction of the Depot uphill. They were late to the battle, but they were, like many of the enemies, completely unexpected.

“They were all supposed to be on the other side of the river fighting the Union, weren’t they?” You asked of Alga.

“That’s what they said,” Alga said, “But the Seismometer operators said that these aren’t the usual vibrations, at least, not what’s marked in any of the operational identifiers. They’re not as heavy. Our people have anti-tank weapons, they might not be too great a threat if they’re anything like the last batch we ran into.”

File: RogzspearenOffensive_9.jpg (1.85 MB, 2000x2000)

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Even still, lightly armored tanks were still fearsome, especially since anti-tank rifles were not particularly accurate weapons, only potent at around one hundred and fifty meters against armor. Had they arrived just moments earlier they could have proven even deadlier, but now? It’d be suicide for them to close to the range they’d need to be able to see, to fight. So they’d probably hold back…until you could see what they were properly.

A new quiet descended. Your men might have tried to pursue the enemy, but they were quite good at slipping away in general, let alone in this impossible weather. Alga said it would clear soon- should you continue your plan of envelopment, having won this phase of the battle? You were no closer to your objectives, but none of your units had sustained crippling damage, and like as not, there would be no enemy as fearsome as that which you’d just forced back…

…and the enemy knew that.

>Battle Momentum increased to 1- all friendly rolls boosted by 10.

Though the mist had been useful to you thus far, the disadvantages were obvious from the fighting that had just occurred. Through all of it, your mortars had been forced to be idle. Without proper sense of where friendly units were positioned and the fighting being so chest to chest, mortar support had been impossible- and if the enemy had their artillery on standby, they would similarly have been unable to intervene.
With such in mind however, perhaps you would rather press the attack?

>Resume the plan from before, without fear of enemy interruptions. Spread your forces out for a proper attack from all sides on Depot 8R, as soon as the fog lifted.
>Keep the momentum going. The mists served an attacker closing distance well, so what better cover to advance into urban terrain under? Immediately have units move into Depot 8R as quickly as they are able to.
>Would it be wise to allow this enemy to retreat and reform? One half of your forces should perfectly be able to take over the Depot. The rest should advance west- to pursue and eliminate the dangerous foes, perhaps even to re-secure your side of the river…
>Other?

>>6335706
>Would it be wise to allow this enemy to retreat and reform? One half of your forces should perfectly be able to take over the Depot. The rest should advance west- to pursue and eliminate the dangerous foes, perhaps even to re-secure your side of the river…

I'm thinking this (as long as our eastern forces have anti tank guns). If they can get into the city then they can get up close to the casemates and do damage.

The western group should try to eliminate that threat, otherwise they'll just come up from behind when we advance further north.

>>6335706
>Resume the plan from before, without fear of enemy interruptions. Spread your forces out for a proper attack from all sides on Depot 8R, as soon as the fog lifted.
The current enemy forces we know about has been bloodied enough for me to feel somewhat secure in giving a bit of time for the mist to break.
Those unknown casemate contacts also give me enough pause to want to be able to see them before running straight into them.

>>6335706
>Keep the momentum going. The mists served an attacker closing distance well, so what better cover to advance into urban terrain under? Immediately have units move into Depot 8R as quickly as they are able to.

I'd argue their casemate's effectiveness would be significantly blunted if we can force them into urban combat

>>6335744
I agree, especially with the fog. We can get really close with our AT.

>>6335706
>Keep the momentum going. The mists served an attacker closing distance well, so what better cover to advance into urban terrain under? Immediately have units move into Depot 8R as quickly as they are able to.

>>6335706
>Keep the momentum going. The mists served an attacker closing distance well, so what better cover to advance into urban terrain under? Immediately have units move into Depot 8R as quickly as they are able to.

>>6335713
Chase down that foe and finish them off.

>>6335737
Commit solely to maneuver. Enough fighting in the fog.

>>6335744
>>6335760
>>6335803
>>6335950
If fog fighting is suiting you so well, why stop while you're ahead? Show the molemen how the Dawn finds them.

Updating.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_10.jpg (1.77 MB, 2000x2000)

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An unsaid consensus was had amongst the captains for pressing the attack- and the orders for that were given, though they were likely already carrying them out. Were the enemy casemates worthy of consideration? Yes: in that if they were truly at the Depot, they were in a terrible position to receive an immediate assault. The Sovereignty’s forces were disrupted right now, and the best gamble to make during a disruption was exploiting the chaos.

It was a gamble, as anything in war was, but you doubted that behind the elite troops would be even more of them, especially since the Rangers and even the Penitent had withdrawn. The prevalence of Filament for instantaneous communication added to a potential cause for reactivity: being actively ordered back. It very well could be that you’d catch the line behind in a state of withdrawal as well.

Avoiding the obvious place mines might be, straight up the middle, your companies sweep around the flanks, and on the east, they surge directly into the Depot, quickly encountering surprised militia conscripts, surely shocked that the battle had come to them so quickly. First Company came from thinning mist to find Regulars, it seemed, at the ready. Regulars and militia were difficult to tell apart, but the preparedness and discipline told true of whom they were. Whether that would be enough against the crack troops of the Aurora Legion would be another story.

>Roll 3 sets of 1d100

Rolled 45 (1d100)

>>6336014

Rolled 83 (1d100)

>>6336014

Rolled 86 (1d100)

>>6336014

Rolled 61 (1d100)

>>6336014

Rolled 19, 96, 48 = 163 (3d100)

>>6336015
>>6336017
>>6336021
Alright, and to compete.

>>6336022
A hair too late, huh.

On the eastern side of the Depot, where militia were not as ready as they thought in their defense, your companies smashed into them without warning, simultaneously, straight out of the mists that may as well have been solid walls to those who did not know battle. The Wolkmihnar encountered respectably stiff resistance, but as soon as they were in close combat, the paths and compounds became charnel houses, even the inexperienced Union troops still much better equipped and trained for melee battle and the confusion of urban battle. Meanwhile, 4th Company had barreled straight into and through their enemy. The Militia were absolutely unprepared for the numerous motorcycles, modified and appropriated trucks, and all manner of collected motor transport fitted with improvised gun mountings to suddenly be everywhere within and around them. Sosaldtians knew little of waiting for surrender- from what you heard, most of the enemy was slaughtered were they stood, ignorant of just how doomed they were. The shreds of what were left terrified the adjacent unit into collapse. Those that could not flee uncoordinated in whatever direction they thought safe simply threw down their arms and hid or surrendered. The depot was as good as yours, even though the proper infantry still defied 1st Company.

Not that they were winning that battle. They had taken their bite of 1st Company, but 1st Company had chewed up their foe far worse, even fighting uphill. They were alone in fighting now, it was revealed as the mist cleared up to what it was like before. They could try to resist, but their elimination one way or the other was inevitable.

The mist clearing up revealed other things- the identity of the unknown Casemates, for example.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_11.jpg (1.68 MB, 2000x2000)

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Captain Schoenbijter reported them first, observing that they were indeed unlike what had been seen of the Sovereignty before. They seemed to be here for good reason, since from what your Sosaldtian-Valstener captain said, they were lightly armed and thinly plated armored vehicles, unlikely to be very useful in combat against their panzer peers. They were also likely not to be of any elite sort- they were running off without having fired a shot in support. That might have been the smart move, so that they might lend their firepower to the next engagement, but it would earn them no admirers amongst your lot.

Other observations included the sighting of rangers to the northeast, though they were withdrawing, almost certainly to Rogzpearen, and uninterested in contesting the Depot. It had lost whatever value it had as a defensive bulwark, and as your troops reported, despite being a Depot, it had long been stripped of anything valuable besides the minimum to sustain a brief defensive action. Also interesting was news to the west. A company of Citizen Guards had returned to the gory field of the massacre of their allies, but had found none of the enemy occupying the positions. Perhaps your triumph in the field had caused a general withdrawal? It made you think about whether it was once again time to change plans…

>Continue driving northwards towards the main objective. The full weight of the Legion and its allies would descend quickly- and bring this operation to a swift close before there was any chance of enemy reinforcement…
>This might be an opportunity to seize more of the field. Split off a portion of the battalion to strike west to Vehrblaend again, while the rest push for the primary target of Rogzpearen. (Who to split off?)
>The enemy would be expecting you to push from the south- and would have long prepared for it. Leave behind a small defensive force to hold your gains, but redirect the majority of your troops to the west- you’ll attack the objective from their side of the river. (Who to leave behind at the Depot?)
>Other?

>>6336048
>Continue driving northwards towards the main objective. The full weight of the Legion and its allies would descend quickly- and bring this operation to a swift close before there was any chance of enemy reinforcement…
We outnumber them and have kept the initiative, it would be a waster to give all that up for a long and time consuming manouvre.

>>6336048
>This might be an opportunity to seize more of the field. Split off a portion of the battalion to strike west to Vehrblaend again, while the rest push for the primary target of Rogzpearen. (Who to split off?)
While I hate to see them go, we still had a full strength penitent unit knocking around the West flank and that group we saw off in the field could still cause problems if they all grouped up together. To keep some Hail Judge longshot from breaking into our backlines I think having at least someone with some bite to help secure that territory with the Militia is warranted.
Just for the love of the Future don't get instakilled by an ambush coming out of that mist hole again.

>>6336071
I forgot to specify, this is about sending only the 1st over.

>>6336048
>This might be an opportunity to seize more of the field. Split off a portion of the battalion to strike west to Vehrblaend again, while the rest push for the primary target of Rogzpearen. (Who to split off?)

Send 4th west, they're the fastest of the Legion here so they should be able to scout out Vehrblaend and report back pretty quickly.

>>6336048
Supporting >>6336120

>>6336054
Continue to smash northwards.

>>6336071
Send 1st Company west to impose itself.

>>6336120
>>6336358
Send the 4th west as a probing action.

I'll wait a couple more hours before calling it.

Alright, going with splitting off the 4th for a scouting action and pushing the rest up. Updating.

Rolled 46, 17, 68 = 131 (3d100)

Oh, and another thing to take care of quickly.
For something minor and rather certain I'm sure it isn't minded that I roll for you.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_12.jpg (1.66 MB, 2000x1998)

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As First and Fifth companies were cleaning up the remaining enemy contingent guarding Depot 8R, you sent further orders through Alga and the staff. The two of you had come to the conclusion that Vehrblaend, while not currently worth a complete effort to assault in full, was still worth investigating. Many enemies had retreated in that direction, and there was an unaccounted-for assault unit that was one of some that made very short work of militia just like the ones that now guarded your flank. Fourth Company, the most mobile by far, was given this task, the remainder of the battalion commanded to form up and begin advancing northwards to the main objective.

While the last enemy infantry put up a stubborn fight, they weren’t a match for one of the Legion’s companies, let alone another full one pressing on their flank. Soon enough, they were overwhelmed, and the remainder able to surrendered. Combined with the surrendered militia, there was not quite a few to account for. The job of guarding them would be trusted to the Citizen Guards, a company of which would not occupy the Depot. It left your flank somewhat open, but since 4th Company was moving past them anyways, it seemed the resourceful decision.

During this the headquarters had to move up, along with the mortars, to a hill you’d initially planned to make the post for this battle anyways. By the time the mortars might be dragged up to the Depot while still ready to fire the battle might have ended its offensive phase.

Time passed on without any new sounds of fighting, though a distant battle was echoing over the river. A terrifically fierce one with many large caliber weapons- a clash of casemates. It made you think of the ones that had briefly appeared here then absconded. Would they remain here, or go to their allies across the river? Even light casemates here tended to have what were called heavy repeaters, rather large and forceful weapons akin to an anti-aircraft gun, though they had the lack of velocity many Harzwohlkan weapons shared because of the lower potency of their bluepowder.

“Do you think,” you asked Alga idly, “That holding Rogzpearen is important to the Sovereignty? I’m considering if we should expect reinforcements to immediately try and throw us from the town.”

Alga had a quick answer. “I think they’d rather not lose it, but Rookpoel would still fall even if they held it. So if they’re losing Rookpoel, I think, from the way they fight, the Sovereignty would have a secondary motivation in making this a bitter battle. It’s hard to say without knowing how the other battle over there is going.” He jerked his head west.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_13.jpg (1.7 MB, 2000x1998)

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That information would not be forthcoming, loathe as the Harzwohlkan were to part with any information, their military command explicitly kept operational knowledge limited to mercenaries of all things. One thing was certain though. If they won, you’d hear of it quickly, and if they lost, they would say nothing and circuitously deny or ignore any queries about the events.

As the line advanced, it hesitated, just for a bit, to allow the Citizen Guards to take control of prisoners, and to allow forward pickets to scout further. Apparently, some of First Company’s prisoners were receiving prompt interrogation, and revealed the existence of where Viper Fields had been placed. They had been laid heavier around Rogzpearen, only one approach having been mined to the Depot. Perhaps they lacked the numbers of the weapons needed to fortify as heavily as they’d like, especially on a secondary front.

A concern was sent from Second Company concerning that; as the approached from the southeast and east of Rogzpearen seemed to be so heavily mined, the actual approaches were limited. Which also meant there was only so many places the enemy Rangers might have disappeared to northwards…or where they might be hiding, along with other hidden things. The Seismometer indicated the casemates had retreated into Rogzpearen as well. Clearly, the enemy had decided to fight for it. Even if the village that the 3rd Wolkmihnar Company had pushed into had been empty save for a few old inhabitants who could not flee.

Word came from the west as well. Forward patrols from Fourth Company revealed that the enemy you’d beaten was not to be found in Vehrblaend, but a Penitent Brethren company remained in defensive positions, waiting. Only a fool would presume they were the only ones standing guard, though, given the numbers you had on the field- else they would return back over the bridge whence they came…they were too far out of position to return to aid the assault on Rogzpearen without significant delay now, but the minefields limited how many might simultaneously attack anyways.

>Plan your assault, and any other maneuvers.
>Other Things?

>>6336571
>Some questions
How difficult to traverse are these mist holes generally? Are they just lower sections of the terrian where mist is pooling in or are they more like chasms or steep canyons?
Also, if the Mortars do not have to move, are they available to fire every turn? Are they able to fire at the penitent unit now for attacks made this turn?

>>6336626
>How difficult to traverse are these mist holes generally? Are they just lower sections of the terrian where mist is pooling in or are they more like chasms or steep canyons?
The former. They're appreciably deeply dipped but they're depressions rather than a hole you have to worry about falling into. The same would not be so if they were holes that the mist was actually being produced from rather than collecting in though...which none of these are, though.
>Also, if the Mortars do not have to move, are they available to fire every turn? Are they able to fire at the penitent unit now for attacks made this turn?
They can, though bombardments made against targets in heavy cover such as urban terrain have a lot of damage reduction, and if a unit can actively take cover instead of, say, being pinned in a fight, they won't be as battered as they'd otherwise be.
I'll probably have to include some ammunition mechanic for it some place but we'll see if you fire them off enough for me to think of it again.

File: how I learned to stop fea(...).png (7.79 MB, 2000x1998)

7.79 MB PNG

>>6336571
>Plan your assault, and any other maneuvers.
If I was the Sovs, I would have units posted up in those mist holes ready to ambush whoever goes down that middle road with the casemates and mortars ready to bombard anyone stuck out in the open.
That being my prediction, I think it would be easier just to dive into the mist ourselves and have a knife fight without any casemate or mortar interference. For whatever it counts the bad guys don't know we know about the minefields, so I am betting they might hold off on hitting us to get off a better ambush and we can chance use that to hit them first instead.

>Wolk 3rd and our 5th
These companies will move up but before hitting the minefield cut East and assault into the smaller mist hole. If there is something in there hopefully we kill it and can move on to leapfrog again into the larger mist hole or even try to heroically attack the town.

>Wolk 3rd and our 1st
1st company will be advancing straight down the road to help sell the plan, but hopefully before entering the casemates ideal range they too will attack into the mist along with the Wolkmihnar 4th from the other side of the hole.

>2nd Company
While everyone else is being fed to crabs, these fine men will try to go hunting for the flanks of those casemates. If they can sneak past the mines hopefuly they can get into the town or at least near enough to start picking at the casemates.

>4th Company, the Mortars, and Extras
Since the fighting up north is going to be in a lot of mist and urban environments, we might not have too many ideal targets to choose from. Therefore I am thinking 4th company can move next to the Militia unit down there and start harassing the penitents to see if they can bait out a fight. The Mortars job is then to hit anything that starts running out at our boys, who hopefully can hold enough to let the big guns do their work.

>>6336571
Supporting >>6336716

>>6336571
I'll support >>6336716 too

>>6336716
High effort strategizing.
Supporting.

>>6336716
>>6336812
>>6336816
>>6336864
All in on the plan.

Updating.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_14.jpg (1.67 MB, 2000x1998)

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Second Company’s fears were plenty sound. If you were of the Sovereignty’s command and had a respect for the troops placed into your command, you would prepare ambushes on the lines of advance. If you were an officer of the rangers whom specialized in hit and run attacks and irregular battle, then you would wait in those mist holes. Was that a reason to think they might actually not do so, in a bid to predict your predictions? No, this was the sort of tactic that it would be foolish not to do. The depressions were directly before the objective settlement. To leave them undefended would be to invite a repeat of the assault that had conquered the Depot.

Like it or not, you would have to descend through the mist and engage the enemy in bloody hand to hand, then follow that up with urban combat. This would be butcher’s work indeed, but it was the best plan of action. Especially if you clung to conventional thought that would have sent you through minefields, and likely, being fired upon by all the ordinance the enemy could muster once they knew where you were. If you moved hastily and impetuously in the attack along the right line, you could outrun the enemy’s reactions as well as overturn expectation.

So, your troops began to converge towards the sole gap in the line they could advance through without fear of Vipers, and meanwhile, 4th Company was given its own special task. As your mortars, so powerful yet still underutilized, could not effectively support your people in the chaos of foggy close battle nor in an urban brawl without striking dangerously closely, they would instead aid an endeavor by 4th Company and one of the Citizen Guard companies- to try and start a field battle over the south again, at a distance that would spoil the assault troops’ main tactics.

File: RogzspearenOffensive_15.jpg (1.69 MB, 2000x1998)

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The first news was unexpected, but not bad- 5th Company advanced into one depression of mist, a small one but still enough for a company to try to hide in- and found naught. First Company then veered from the road to the mist, at the same time as your Wolkmihnar allies, as well as 2nd Company slipping round the flank. In that mist, and beyond…all hell broke loose at once, to the point that no picture could be painted of what was occurring. All you could do not was wait- and trust that your Legion could prevail.

>Roll for each of your units in combat- first for 1st, then for 2nd, 4th, 5th, Mortars, and the Wolkmihnar and Militia, 7 sets of 1d100 in all.
Rolling multiple times is fine, but try to let time pass for other people to try it. I’ll be at work the rest of the day anyways.

Rolled 96 (1d100)

>>6337254

Rolled 42 (1d100)

>>6337254

Rolled 48 (1d100)

>>6337254

Rolled 13 (1d100)

>>6337254

Rolled 54 (1d100)

>>6337254

Rolled 22 (1d100)

>>6337254

Rolled 48 (1d100)

>>6337254
Do we still have the +10 momentum modifier for our rolls?

Rolled 17, 14, 55, 80, 9, 88, 81 = 344 (7d100)

>>6337409
You do, Momentum is a constant for the battle, at least, until it changes by winning or losing more, or something like an entire day passing happens.
I've been not been explaining the exact modifiers out of trying not to make things too granular but momentum is pretty simple.
Let's see if I can do this while out, huh. Order is simply left to right map-relative, save for the last which is something else. Will give me time to think about what to write at least.

Rolled 1 (1d2)

>>6337413
Actually before I look at that I probably should have that been in order of friendly rolls based on who they're fighting so it's less confusing, huh.
Well, I'll flip for it, 1 for the less confusing system, 2 to suffer the consequences of my actions.

>>6337415
Does the engineering package we have include any demining capabilities?

All hell had broken loose everywhere, but what was important were such shifts that they took no time to pierce through the chaos of battle. Little ground had been taken, but the mists and powder smoke might bring the fog back at the rate the latter spewed forth.

From the south, a battle had erupted which was a mutual slugfest. The enemy wasn’t backing down- they accepted this fight, though they were content to wait within the cover of the occupied town rather than coming out in the assault yet. It spoke to a hesitancy in their odds- which likely meant they were in your favor, but since 4th Company’s help was in the form of questionably useful militia, you weren’t sure if attacking was truly the best decision, especially with the certainty of yet more enemy being present, though the mortars might even the odds further as they already had. They had reportedly significantly disrupted the Penitents, but the damage being said disruption was said to be quite minor, because of the cover they fought from.

Captain Schoenbijter sent a message down the filament, asking if he should commit further or not. He shared the opinion that, while he could probably take on this enemy, the militia that would have to help in providing sufficient numbers to attack, probably could not…

>Continue ranged battle. The mortars would cause enough damage and disruption over time that knocking over the remnants would be facile.
>Execute the assault. If you gave the enemy too much time, they might call for reinforcements, and capturing the south in quick order would become impossible.
>Disengage. If the enemy wanted to come to you, that was one thing, but fighting them like this was a waste.
>Other?

File: RogzspearenOffensive_15_2.jpg (1.71 MB, 2000x1998)

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Enemy artillery had also shown its hand, though its attack was directed towards 2nd Company, whose loose formation meant they weathered the damage in spite of being caught in the open. The enemy casemates they engaged also hadn’t gotten the better of them. They were intimidated by the fire of anti-tank rifle teams, though their cover also meant that little damage had been inflicted. Better sighting of the vehicles confirmed they were of a lesser quality than before- roughly made, square-angled rather than rounded. Cheap looking vehicles, though they were swift enough to not be underestimated.

Of those who dove into the mist and found enemies waiting in ambush, the enemy turned out to be the ones surprised. First Company barreled through a battle-worn contingent of Rangers and utterly annihilated them, whilst the Wolkmihnar 4th Company encountered yet another fearsome group of Rangers accompanied by their monstrous support. In most situations that this happened, you were told, this resulted in the unlucky opponent of the crustaceans being swiftly slaughtered. This did not happen, though your allies were succeeding in surviving rather than by besting their foe.

The same could not be said of 5th Company, unfortunately. Assaulting the objective head on, and the first in doing so, they received the undivided attention of the defenders and paid a heavy price for the ground they took. They reached the enemy in hand to hand fighting, but were not doing well. Dulechamp was not too ashamed to call for reinforcements- but the closest to hand to come quickly were 1st Company, and if they did not aid the Wolkmihnar against the monsters in the mist, a quick turn in fortunes could destroy your allies and leave the rear of your attack open to the deadliest foes you’d fought beneath yet. Alga looked to you- this responsibility seemed to be more yours than his, with the fate of companies on the line.

>You’d have to trust 5th Company to hold out until the Wolkmihnar caught up with them. Everybody else still had foes to fight, and 1st Company wasn’t done in the mist.
>Have 1st Company smash through the ruins they wrought and come to 5th Company’s aid. The best of the Legion would resolve matters quickly, but the Wolkmihnar would have to be tested in turn.
>2nd Company could aid your subterranean allies against the monsters, and that would free up 1st Company to aid the 5th. Yet that risked the enemy casemates surging forth instead of being screened away as they were…
>Other?

>>6337492
>Does the engineering package we have include any demining capabilities?
Not in any specialist capacity, though the traditional methods of "look and step carefully with a shovel" or "explode the ground really hard" are there, but dealing with Vipers requires completely different tactics. They're more defensively oriented in regards to preparing fortifications and excavation and demolition. The engineers can do demining but it's not something they can do quickly and during active combat.

>>6337628
>Have 1st Company smash through the ruins they wrought and come to 5th Company’s aid. The best of the Legion would resolve matters quickly, but the Wolkmihnar would have to be tested in turn.

>>6337628
>Have 1st Company smash through the ruins they wrought and come to 5th Company’s aid. The best of the Legion would resolve matters quickly, but the Wolkmihnar would have to be tested in turn.

>>6337657
>>6337659
There's a prior option to choose too for 4th Company: >>6337626

>>6337661
shid
>>6337626
>Continue ranged battle. The mortars would cause enough damage and disruption over time that knocking over the remnants would be facile.

>>6337628
>Continue ranged battle. The mortars would cause enough damage and disruption over time that knocking over the remnants would be facile.
>You’d have to trust 5th Company to hold out until the Wolkmihnar caught up with them. Everybody else still had foes to fight, and 1st Company wasn’t done in the mist.
As much as it hurts to leave Dulechamp out hanging like this, those crabs are the bigger threat.

>>6337628
>Disengage. If the enemy wanted to come to you, that was one thing, but fighting them like this was a waste.

>You’d have to trust 5th Company to hold out until the Wolkmihnar caught up with them. Everybody else still had foes to fight, and 1st Company wasn’t done in the mist.

Swap the mortars over to support 5th, all 4th and the Militia need to do is delay the western Sovs from advancing beyond the bridgehead.

>>6337626
>Continue ranged battle. The mortars would cause enough damage and disruption over time that knocking over the remnants would be facile.

>>6337628
>Have 1st Company smash through the ruins they wrought and come to 5th Company’s aid. The best of the Legion would resolve matters quickly, but the Wolkmihnar would have to be tested in turn.

File: what_is_this_unit_doing.png (604 KB, 636x506)

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>>6337628
which unit on the right hand side is this one in pink? It has a 3 on the left, and is orange, but so is the other one in the depot?

Can they move into the mist and fight the crabs while 1st move to support 5th? Or are they too far away?

>Continue ranged battle.
>Have 1st Company smash through the ruins they wrought and come to 5th Company’s aid.

>>6337810
That is the 3rd Wolkmihnar, the W on the side and the blue rim, the other one is militia, green outlined and not under direct authority, and though they can be bullied, they're not sticking with you after this op.

I want to say they're *just* too far to charge in more than two hundred meters to point blank with assault stance, but I haven't exactly been breaking out the ruler and reading the millimeter markings either and the exact area a unit covers is rather abstract. So I'll say it'd be a roll on whether they can or not since they're trying to go into extreme low visibility as a coordinated assault at rapid pace. That's not a precedent on warhammer style "roll for charge distance" it's just that this is a bit of an odd case.

>>6337823
thats fine, it does look like they'd be too far out of range for this turn. Happy to go with your ruling on this, rather than rolling for it. Their allies seem to be holding their own against the crabs, so hopefully (with some good rolls) they can continue to do so.

>>6337626
>Continue ranged battle. The mortars would cause enough damage and disruption over time that knocking over the remnants would be facile.

>>6337628
>Have 1st Company smash through the ruins they wrought and come to 5th Company’s aid. The best of the Legion would resolve matters quickly, but the Wolkmihnar would have to be tested in turn.

>>6337664
>>6337709
>>6337798
>>6337810
>>6337883
Nothing wrong with what's going on, so keep at it.

>>6337789
Keep away from the slugs southwards.

>6337664
>6337798
>6337810
>6337883
1st Company north, the rest as they are.

>6337709
>6337789
Keep the 1st in the hole.

Alright then, I'll need another set of 7 1d100s, but in the interest of keeping things going with some speed, give me 3 sets of 2d100 and 1d100.